Insert Clever Matrix Parody Name Here
by Radioactive
Summary: This is my parody of The Matrix 1. I will try to update it frequently. Please review!
1. Trinity's Chase

Author's Notes: The Wachowski brothers made up The Matrix, its story and all of its characters. I did not make up any of it, nor do I claim to have done so. Just clearing that up. Anyway, on with my story!

**Insert Clever Matrix Parody Name Here**

**Chapter 1: Trinity's Chase**

The green words displaying the information of the call that the computer was tracing scrolled across the screen.

_2/18/98—(302) 555-0690—I Can't Remember the Rest of What It Said_

The sound of a phone ringing was heard. A voice on one end of the line spoke after a few seconds.

"_Yeah."_

The voice of a woman was then heard, speaking on the other end of the line.

"_Is everything in place?"_

"_You weren't supposed to relieve me."_

"_I know, but I felt like taking a shift."_

"_But, now I won't get paid for my shift, and you will!"_

"_Ha-ha!"_

"_Grr...anyway, you took this shift 'cause you _like _watching him, don't you?"_

"_No, I didn't!"_

"_You _so _like him!"_

"_Nuh-uh!"_

"_Yah-huh!"_

"_Nuh-uh!"_

"_You're just denying it."  
"No, I'm—"_

"_Either way, we're gonna kill him. You understand that?"_

"_Morpheus believes he is The One."_

"_Do you?"  
"It doesn't matter what I think."_

"_No, it doesn't."_

"_Hey! Shut up!"_

"_Ha-ha! You do believe he's The One, don't you?"_

"_Did you hear that?"_

"_Hear what?"_

"_Are you sure this line is clean?"_

"_Well, there's some peanut butter on the receiver..."_

"_No, I meant are you sure it isn't wiretap—peanut butter?"_

"_I guess I _should _clean it up..."_

"_Oh, god. I hate talking to you. I'm leaving."_

The woman who had been speaking hung the phone up. Her name was Trinity. She was sitting in her apartment. There was not much more than a phone in her apartment. She didn't need anything else. Well, except food.

_Hmm...I should really go grocery shopping..._ she thought.

Outside her apartment door, two special units of policemen armed to the teeth with weapons stood outside her door.

"Pizza man!" called a voice of one of the policemen from outside the door.

"Which restaurant is this pizza from?" asked Trinity.

"Dominoes," responded the policeman.

"Go away," yelled Trinity.

"Pizza Hut," corrected the policeman.

"That's more like it!" said Trinity, getting up and walking to the door. She opened it up and saw all of the policemen.

"Wow. They sure have changed the delivery boy uniforms..." remarked Trinity.

"No, we're here to arrest you!" snapped a policeman.

"Oh!" said Trinity. "Please, come in!"

"Oh, thank you!" said a policeman as Trinity and the other policemen stepped into her apartment.

Outside on the street, several squad cars and a group of policeman stood at the door to Trinity's apartment building. Three men stood with the policemen. They all wore black suits, sunglasses, and microphones in their ears. Their names were Agent Jones, Agent Brown and Agent Smith. One of the officers was eating a box of doughnuts while talking to Agent Smith.

"Oh, man! Jelly filled, coconut glazed, these doughnuts are amazing! Want one, Smitty?"

Agent Smith stared at him.

"No," he muttered. "And don't call me 'Smitty'."

"Sure thing, Smitty!"

"I just said—oh, never mind. Do you think your officers can capture her?"

"We sent two units in. I think we can handle one little girl."

"Actually, she's 30 years old, and a convicted felon," corrected Agent Smith.  
"R...really? Oh, crap. I thought she was, like, _5_. Man, I shouldn't have sent my worst men in to get her..."  
"It doesn't matter how bad your officers are," said Smith. "For they are already dead."  
_"No, we're not!"_ said a voice from the apartment building.

The sound of several gunshots and a cool kung-fu action sequence were heard.

"_Okay, now we're dead!" _said the voice.

"That doesn't make any sense," remarked the policeman.

"Let's go!" announced Agent Smith.

Him, the policeman, and Agent Jones took off running. Only two people stayed. Agent Brown and one of the police officers stayed behind.

"That's a very good question," said Agent Brown. "You see, the thing about boysenberries is that you have to soak them in maple syrup before you microwave them to get that fresh, milky taste."  
"Um... I don't know what that means...I wasn't even talking to you. You just came up to me and said 'That's a very good question. You see, the thing about boysenberries is that you have to soak them in maple syrup before you microwave them to get that fresh, milky taste.'"

"I did?"

"Yes, you did. And shouldn't we be following them?" asked the officer, motioning to the other policemen and agents.

"No, they'll catch up," assured Agent Brown.

"But, _we're _behind _them_."

"Just...shut up!"

Meanwhile, Agent Smith, Agent Jones and the policemen were running over rooftops, chasing Trinity. One of the policemen was too fat from eating so many doughnuts, so the roof of one of the building they ran over collapsed, and the policeman fell into the dining room of someone's apartment. The person eating there just stared at him for a moment, and then took out his cell phone and dialled 9-1-1.

"Hello, police?" the guy said.

"Yes?" asked the policeman.

"Oh, right," said the guy.

Meanwhile, the policemen and the agents were still chasing Trinity. Eventually, they came to a street. The policemen thought that they had Trinity cornered, but she then did a humongous jump and flew from one side of the street to the roofs of the buildings on the other side. The policemen now thought that there was no way they could catch up to her now. But the agents would not give up. Smith did an amazing jump just like Trinity's jump into the air.

"That's impossible!" cried one of the officers.

"Nothing is impossible if you believe!" said Smith, but saying this distracted him from looking where he was going, and he fell short of the other side of the street. He fell to the ground and hit the sidewalk painfully.

"Oww...that sucked..." muttered Smith. He got up and walked into the building he was in front of, and walked into the elevator. He pressed the button for the top floor, and felt the elevator rising. He could hear low elevator music playing in the background. He began singing along to it.

"_Raindrops keep fallin' on my head!  
But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turnin' red!  
Cryin's not for me!  
'Cause I'm never gonna stop the rain by complainin'!  
Because I'm free,  
Nothin's worryin' me!"  
_

_Bing! _The sound of the elevator stopping was heard. Smith got out of the elevator, walked up a few stairs and on to the roof. He looked over. Trinity was on the next roof. He began sprinting across the roof of the buildings after Trinity. Trinity herself took out a cell phone anddialed a number.

"_Operator,"_ said the voice on the other end.

"I need an exit."

"_There's one on the street a few houses over. Use the fire escape to get there."_

"You can't tell me what to do!"

"_What?"_

"That is _it! _I'm never talking to you again, starting...now!"

She hung up, and continued running a few more buildings until she came to an alleyway. She dived forward and smashed through a window on the building on the other side. There was a staircase right in front of the window. She had not expected a staircase. She slammed into the ground and bounced onto the stairs, and painfully rolled down the staircase, yelling in pain whenever she hit a step.

"Ow! Ooh! Eee! Ouch! Ahh! Eek! Gah! Shlim! Bronk! Mirn! Blorf! Glorkenheim!"

After a few seconds, she landed on the floor. She drew her handgun and held it up in the direction of the window, waiting for Smith to walk through. She waited for a few seconds more. He didn't seem to be coming.

"Come on..." she muttered to herself. "Stay focussed, Trinity...hey, a penny! Wait, no! Stay focussed!"

After a few seconds, Smith did not come. She decided that he was not coming, so she got up and climbed down the fire escape ladder onto the street. She looked around. There was a phone booth on the street. She was about 20 yards from it. She looked across the street. There was a truck there. The three Agents were in it. She turned back to the phone. It was ringing. The truck's engine turned on. It was going to crash into the phone booth. If she didn't answer that phone before the agents crashed their truck into it, she would be killed.

"If I don't answer that phone before the agents crash their tuck into it, I will be killed," she said to herself.

She took off running. The truck began to drive. The race was on. Closer and closer the two got to the phone booth. It looked like Trinity was going to get there first.

"_And Trinity is in the lead!" _said the commentator. _"The agent's truck is just a few feet behind! It looks like Trinity is going to win the gold medal...or something. Oh, what's this? Trinity appears to have slipped! Is this the end for Trinity? No! Because luckily, this sequence is in slo-mo! Trinity gets up, and merely walks towards the phone booth, going much quicker than a semi travelling at 70 miles an hour in slo-mo! Oh, and it seems that this match could be anyone's game! Trinity lunges for the receiver, the agent's semi drives as fast as it can...the semi has smashed into the phone booth! The wreckage is too much to see what happened! And the race is over! The winner is—"_

"Shut up!" snapped Agent Jones. "Where's that voice coming from, anyway?"

"I dunno," muttered Agent Brown. "Let's check the phone booth."  
Smith, Brown and Jones walked out of the truck and looked at the destroyed phone booth. They saw smashed glass, they saw a broken phone, but the one thing they did not see was the mangled corpse of Trinity. She had gotten to the phone first.

"She got out," said Agent Brown.

"Doesn't matter," said Agent Smith.

"Why not?" asked Agent Brown.

"Because I said so," said Agent Smith.

"Aww! Why do you always get to be the boss?" said Agent Brown.

"Because I'm older," said Agent Smith.

"Anyway, the informant was real," said Agent Brown.

"Yes," agreed Agent Smith.

"We have the name of their next target," said Agent Jones.

"The name is Neo," said Agent Brown.

"How do you know?" asked Agent Smith.

"Because I'm psychic," responded Agent Brown.

"AHH!" screamed Agent Brown. "PSYCHIC! EVIL! AHH!"

"We'll need a search running," said Agent Smith.

"It has already begun," said Agent Jones.

"DIE EVIL MONSTER!" screamed Agent Jones as he took out a gun and fired a shot at Agent Jones. Agent Jones easily dodged it.

"I'm an Agent, moron," muttered Agent Jones.

"Oh, right," murmured Agent Brown. "The whole 'super-fast movement' thing. I forgot."

"I don't know _why _I hired you, Brown," said Agent Smith.

"Because I said I'd give you cookies if you hired me," said Agent Brown.

"Hey," said Agent Smith. "You never even gave me those cookies! You lair! I'll kill you!"

"_Oh, crap," muttered Agent Brown._


	2. Neo's Calling

Chapter 2: Neo's Calling 

The skilled computer hacker Thomas Anderson (or, as he called himself in case the government asked, Neo) sat in front of his computer, half asleep, as images of a web search scrolled across the screen. Neo had rigged the computer to search every page on the internet concerning information about a man named Morpheus. So far, he had only found pages about the police's pointless tries to capture him. He was half asleep as he listened to the sound of low music playing to try to calm his nerves.

"_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!_

_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!_

_WE COME FROM THE LAND OF THE ICE AND SNOW!_

_FROM THE MIDNIGHT SUN WHERE THE HOT SPRINGS BLOW!_

_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!_

_AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!"_

_So relaxing,_ he thought to himself. Just then, he noticed the whole screen of his computer went black. Words began appearing on the screen. It said this:

Trinity420 says:

sup?

Neo began typing back.

Neo105 says:

n2m. u?

Trinity420 says:

n2m.

Tinity420 says:

The Matrix still has you...

Neo105 says: The Mattress? 

Trinity420 says:

No, The Matrix.

Neo105 says:

Oh.

Trinity420 says:

Follow the white rabbit...

Neo105 says:

Huh?

Trinity420 says:

Knock, knock, Neo...

Suddenly, there was a loud knocking on his door.

"AAAAAAH!" he screamed. He looked back at the computer screen.

_Trinity420 has left the conversation._

"Crap!" muttered Neo. "I wanted to see if she would be my friend...I'll be alone forever."

He opened the door. Choi, another computer hacker he knew, was standing there. His girlfriend Dujour was standing next to him. She had a strange coil wrapped around her neck.

"Hey," said Choi.

"Hi," murmured Neo, still looking at Dujour's neck.

"I need that program," said Choi.

"Do you have the—that's it, I have to ask, can you breathe in that thing?"

Dujour stared at him.

"No," she said. "Some homeless guy put it on my neck when he was trying to kill me."

"Oh."

"Anyway, I need that disk."

"Do you have the money?"

"All fifty grand."  
Choi handed Neo $50, 000.

"One second," said Neo. He walked into the apartment and took out a hollowed-out copy of the book _Simulation and Simulacra_, where he hid all of his illegal hacking program disks. Well, he should have kept them in a copy of _Simulation and Simulacra_. Instead, he just kept then in a rolled up copy of a newspaper from a few weeks ago. He took out one of the disks, put Choi's money on the desk, and walked over back to the door. He handed Choi the disk. Choi looked at it. It was very small.

"What the...? What is this thing? This isn't a disk! It's a puny cookie thing! This thing's, like, an Oreo!"

"Oh, yeah, about that...it shrunk it the wash."  
"Aww, crap."

"Yeah."  
"Well, anyway, we're gonna go to a part tonight. Wanna come?"

"Oh, I dunno...I mean, I do have work tomorrow..."  
Just then, something caught Neo's eye. It was on Dujour. Neo slapped her.

"Ow!" she cried. "What did you do that for?"

"Mosquito."  
"Oh."  
"Hey, cool tattoo!"  
"I know! I got it at Ricky's, down the street! He makes awesome tattoos! Strange, though. He only does rabbits. I said I wanted a flaming skull, but he said..."

Neo was no longer listening. He had now noticed that her tattoo was of a white rabbit.

"Follow the white rabbit..." 

"On second though," said Neo, "I think I will come."

"Oh," said Choi. "You're actually coming? I wasn't expecting that...um, okay, you can come, but don't expect me to be there..."

Neo glared at him.

Later, in a nightclub, a huge party raged on. The dim lighting made Neo more nervous then he already been, due to the loud music and drunk stoners yelling at him about the end of the world and stuff.

From across the room, a woman walked over to him.

"Great part, huh?" she asked.

"No, not really."

"Way to kill the mood. Anyway, my name's Trinity."  
_"The _Trinity? The one who hacked the IRS D-Base?"

"No, that was Quadrinity, not Trinity."  
"Oh."

"But I did hack into my friend's MSN account last week!"

"Wow! That was _you? _That's even harder to do than the IRS thing!"

"That was a long time ago."  
"No, it wasn't, it was a week ago."  
"Oh, yeah. I probably shouldn't have publicized that I did that. A bunch of policemen came to my apartment. Pizza delivery, my ass."

"Jesus..."  
"What?"

"I just...thought you were a man..."  
"Most guys do. Hey, wait a second? What do you mean, you thought I was a man?"  
"I just meant—"

"You think I'm so ugly that I look like a man?"  
"No, I was talking about—"

"Shut up and listen."  
She leaned forward until her mouth has right beside Neo's ear.

"I know why you're here," she whispered. "I know what you've been doing... why you hardly sleep, why you live alone, and why night after night, you sit by your computer. You're looking for him. I know because I was once looking for the same thing. And when he found me, he told me I wasn't really looking for him. I was looking for an answer. It's the question, Neo. It's the question that drives us. It's the question that brought you here. You know the question, just as I did."

"Which came first, the chicken or the egg?"  
"What? No, retard! 'What is The Matrix?'"

"I dunno."  
"No, that's the question you know!"

"Oh, yeah."  
"Moron...now, as I was saying. The answer is out there, Neo, and it's looking for you, and it will find you if you want it to."

"What will? The bogeyman?"  
"The bogeym...? No, stupid! The answer!"

"The answer to what?"  
"'What it the Matrix?'!"

"I don't know!"  
"I know you don't! I'm saying that you will find the answer!"

"I will? Oh, I don't want to wait until then! Can't you tell me now?"  
"How stupid are you?"  
"Very."  
"I'm out of here!"

She stormed off angrily.  
Neo paused after she left.

"My _mom_ says I'm cool," he said quietly.

He paused, and then went and to get drunk.

Author's Notes: Okay! Chapter 2 done! A bit shorter than the last one, but this scene was shorter than the last one. I will try to make the agents in the office chapter longer. I will also try to maintain a daily update. Please review!


	3. The Hunt for Neo

Author's Notes: Sorry for having this chapter up so late in the day. Anyway—okay, this might be a long one, so don't get bored half way through and leave.

**Chapter 3: The Hunt for Neo**

The light shone through the window of Neo's apartment and into his eyes. He woke up groggily and looked around.

"Oh...my head...I've got a wicked hangover...what did I do last night? Um...oh, yeah, that chick in the rubber jumpsuit said I'd find out what The Matrix is...sweet!"

He looked around. He saw his clock on his bedside table. It said it was 10:00.

"Stupid alarm clock!" Neo yelled. "Mess with my day, will ya? I'ma cut you!"

Neo took out a switchblade and stabbed it into the clock.

"There!" he said. "Problem solved!"

Neo paused.

"Wait, that doesn't mean I don't have to go to work, it just means that I don't have a clock any more...son of a—!"

I'll just cut this off before I have to up the rating higher than PG-13.

Metacortex. A multi-national software company, and current employer of Neo Anderson. Or, at least, he hoped it still was, because when he had come to work an hour late, he had been summoned to the office of Mr. Rhineheart, Neo's boss.

"Mr. Anderson, you seem to have a problem with authority. You think that you are somehow special, and that you are allowed to come to work late, unlike everyone else. Metacortex is a multi-billion-dollar Software Company, and supplier of computers to companies all around the world. Your slacker behavior reflects upon the rest of this company, and we can't allow another slip-up like this too happen, can we?"  
"No, we can't."  
"Man, the author really got the dialogue for this scene way off, didn't he?"  
"Yeah, totally. It's because he saw The Matrix about a week ago, and can't remember a lot of the details."  
"Ah."

Neo sat on his chair in his cubicle on his computer, so amazingly glad that he had not been fired. Currently, he was on his computer on the Internet, logging on to

"Man, that Radioactive sure can write..." he said to himself as he read one of the stories.

A FedEx guy holding a package under his arm walked into his cubicle.

"Thomas Anderson?" he asked.

"That's me."  
"Prove it."  
"What?"  
"How do I know you're Thomas Anderson?"

"Umm...well, I have my I.D. right here..."

Neo handed the FedEx guy his I.D. card. The FedEx guy took the card, glanced left and right, and yelled, "Yoink!", dropped the package, and ran off with Neo's I.D. As he ran through the room, Neo could hear him yelling, "I'm gonna get some booze tonight!"

Neo picked up the package off the floor and looked at it. It was a brown folder without a return address on it. He opened the folder. A cell phone slid out of the folder into Neo's hand. The second the cell phone touched Neo's hand, it began to ring.

"AHHHH!" screamed Neo. He paused, and began singing along to the ring tone.

"_La Cucaracha! La Cucaracha!  
La-la-la-la-la-la-la!_

_La-la-la-la-la! La-la-la-la-la!_

_La-la-la-la-la-la-la!"_

Neo paused.

"Okay, I don't know the words."

He opened the cell phone.

"Hello?"

"Wassssup!" yelled the voice on the other sign.

"Wasssssap!" yelled Neo.

"Ssssssa!"

"Sssssssa!"

"Ahhhhh!"

"Ahhhhhh!"

"Blaaaaaaaah!"

"Okay, this thing went out two years ago. What is it?"

"You've probably already guessed who I am."  
"Um...Cab Calloway?"

"Cab...? No, moron! I'm Morpheus! Trinity was right, you are a moron!"

"Morpheus! That great famous computer hacker! Can I have your autograph?"

"Sure, kid! Who should I make it out—wait a second! We're talking to each other on the _phone! _I'm not even in the same room as you!"  
"Oh, right."

"They're coming for you."  
"Who are."  
_"They _are."  
"They?"  
"Yes, they."  
"You mean those giant ants from that movie?"  
"What? No, retard! I'm saying 'they' so I can say that someone's coming for you without giving out the identity of them in doing so!"  
"I see."  
"Now, look across the room at the elevator."  
Neo put his cell phone at his side and peered over the side of his cubicle wall across the room. He looked at the elevator. Two men were standing there, in black suits and black sunglasses. They were asking another worker for directions. The person they asked pointed in the direction of Neo's cubicle.  
"I have _got _to remember to egg that person's car tomorrow," thought Neo.

"Okay," said Morpheus's voice. "You'll be able to get out of here if you follow my instructions. There' any empty cubicle across the hall. Go there when I say so...now!"

Neo bolted across the hall and into the cubicle across the hall. Sure enough, it was empty. Just as Neo got into the empty cubicle, the two men in suits came up to Neo's cubicle and looked inside. They exchanged glances.

In case you haven't guessed (which you should have, or else you're a moron), the two men were Smith and Jones.

"He's not inside," said Jones.

"Now we'll never win the scavenger hunt," said Smith with a frown. The two agents walked off sadly.

"Okay," said Morpheus's voice. "Follow my directions, and you'll get out of the office building safely. Get up in three seconds, and run to the end of the row, going to the left. Turn around when you get there and hide against the side of the row on you right side."  
Neo waited three seconds, and did as Morpheus had said.

"Now what?"  
"There's an office at the end of the hall. Run down the row and into the office. Try to keep as low as you can."  
Neo ducked down his head and ran across the row and into the office. He shut the door immediately. He saw that he was in Rhineheart's office. Luckily, Rhineheart was not there.

"Now what do I do?" asked Neo.

Morpheus did not answer. Neo could only hear strange, muffling sounds.

"Morpheus?" asked Neo.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said Morpheus's voice. "I was eating a brownie. What did you say?"

"Grr...what do I do now?"

"Oh, right, of course. The escaping, and all that. Well, see that window cleaner's platform on the right side of the room outside on the window?"  
"Yeah."  
"Open the window in front of you. Slide across the ledge until you get to the platform. Use that to get out."  
"What? That's insane!"  
"Look, you're getting out of this building two ways, kid. On that platform, or through them. You've got about an equal chance of both."

Neo groaned.  
_"Fine," _he muttered.

"Don't take that tone with me, young man!" snapped Morpheus.

Neo opened the window in front of him and walked onto the ledge outside of the window. He began to edge across the ledge in the direction of the platform. After a few seconds, he dropped the cell phone. He watched as it fell 50 stories to the ground.

"You moron! This cell phone cost me $500!" yelled Morpheus's voice from the cell phone as it fell. Neo was intimidated by the length of the fall that the phone went through before hitting the ground.

"This is insane!" yelled Neo nervously.

"I agree, the price for gas is getting insane!" yelled a guy next to Neo.

Neo slid back inside the window and into the office.

Neo had let turned himself in to the agents, and after that, he had been taken to the police station and placed under arrest. He had been put into a small white room with nothing but a table, an armed guard at the door and a security camera in the corner.

After a few minutes, Agent Smith walked in. He was carrying a folder in his hand. He sat down at the other end of the table, facing Neo, and put the folder on the table. He opened up the folder. He began looking it over for a moment.

"Hmm..." said Smith.

A waiter walked up.

"Are you finished ordering?"

"Yes, I'll have the chicken enchilada," said Smith.

"And for you?"

"I'll just have coffee, thanks," said Neo.

The waiter took the folder from Smith and walked off. There was a pause.

"That was weird," commented Neo.

"Yeah," said Smith. "Now, on to business. Mr. Anderson, you seem to be living a half-life. In once life, you're Thomas A. Anderson, a law-abiding citizen who works for a respectable software company. You have never broken the law, you pay your taxes, and you help your land lady carry put her garbage on Mondays."  
"No, I don't."  
He—I was getting to that! In the other life, you are a skilled computer thief who uses the hacker alias 'Neo', and have committed every computer crime we have a law against."  
"Uh...no, I'm not!"

"There's really no use hiding it."  
"Aww..."

"Anyway, we know that you have come into contact with a man named Morpheus. This man is dangerous, and a convicted felon. We need your help to capture him, Mr. Anderson. We're willing to wipe the slate clean, give you a fresh start. All that we're asking in return is your cooperation in bringing a known terrorist to justice."

"Yeah, well, that sounds like a pretty good deal," snapped Neo, "But I think I may have a better one. How about I give you the finger—"

Neo held up his middle finger to Smith.

"—and you give me my phone call."

"But Mr. Anderson," said Smith. "What's the point of a phone call if you have no mouth?"  
"But I _do _have a mouth."  
"I know! Just wait a few seconds! Then you won't have a mouth!"  
"Oh."

"Well, you've kind of ruined the drama of this scene."

"Srry. Wht u schnd...hh, Ghd! Mh mhth hs dhshpprhng!"

"Told you."  
"Mrph mrpphh. Murmurph mph mrphph. Mrphmr mrphmph mph?"

"Of course."

"Mph hph," said Neo, and then he began to do what he had asked if he could do: scream as loud as he could.

"MPHPHMPHPMHPHMHPMHPMHPHMHPHPHPHMHPHPHMHPHMHPHMH!!!!"

As Neo's screams filled the room, another agent walked in holding a tiny glass canister. He handed the canister to Smith. Smith took out what was in the canister: what looked like a tiny, robotic scorpion of some sort of animatronic insect. The second agent pushed Neo onto the table and pulled open Neo's shirt. Smith lowered the horrible robot above Neo's stomach. He lowered it right above Neo's belly button, and the creature crawled through it into Neo's body.

"Hhy, thht hcthlly khndha thcklhs," said Neo.

Suddenly, Neo woke up with a start. He looked around. He was in his apartment, in his bed. He immediately put his hand to his mouth. His mouth was not covered in flesh. He had a mouth. He then realized that somewhere between the time he had been in his office and the time he had woken up, he had fallen asleep, and that the whole incident with the agents had been a strange dream. He felt much better.

Just then, his phone rang. He picked it up.

"Hello, Neo."  
"Morpheus!"

"This line is tapped, so I have to talk fast."

"How do you know it's tapped?"

"It's a secret."

"Aww, come on! I'll give you a chocolate bar!"

"Mmm...nah."  
"Aww...anyway, I need you to help me!"

"If you wish to know the answers, meet me at the Cane Street Bridge tonight."

Neo stood under the Cane Street Bridge that night. It was very dark, and the dreary air in the area had intimidated Neo very much. Eventually, a car rolled up beside him. The door opened. Trinity was sitting in the car, next to another woman with short blond hair that Neo did not recognize.

"Get in," said Trinity.

Neo got in the car and sat between Trinity and the other woman.

"I know that your life has been strange for the last couple of days, so I want to know if your willing to stay with us and learn the truth, or you can et out of this car right now and go back to your normal life as a hacker on the run from the law."

Neo paused.

"This is all too much for me," he said. "I'm leaving."

Neo opened the door and began to walk out of the car.

"Please, Neo," said Trinity. "You have to believe me."  
"Why?"

"Because you have been down there, Neo. You know that road, and you know exactly where it ends. And I know that's not where you want to be."

Neo paused again. He though for a moment.

"Okay, I'll stay." He got back in the car. Trinity nodded.

"Step on it, Apoc" she said, turning forward.

"Yeah, you'd like that, wouldn't you?" grunted the man driving the car.

"Open your shirt," said Trinity.

"What?"

"We think you might be bugged. Open your shirt."

Neo paused, and pulled open his shirt. Trinity leaned down to the floor, and pulled out something that looked like a cross between a vacuum cleaner and a jetpack. She took the large tube protruding out of the machine and stuck it over Neo's belly button. She pressed a few buttons on her machine, and Neo felt a humongous pain as a force of excruciatingly strong suction began pulling on his stomach. Trinity, meanwhile, was looking at a small screen on the other side of the machine. The machine was projecting a sonic projection of the area inside Neo's belly button, which was being displayed on the screen that Trinity was looking at. She carefully used her controls to control the level of suction needed to suck out a tiny, robotic scorpion-like creature. After a few seconds of unbearable pain, the tiny creature was sucked out of Neo and deposited in a small glass canister attached to the side of the machine. Neo stared at the tiny robot.

"Jesus Christ! You mean that thing's real?"

"What are you talking about? I didn't say anything."  
"It's a figure of speech."

"Oh, yeah."  
"Moron."  
"Hey, that's my name for you! You can't use that!"  
"Oh. Sorry."

Somehow, the meeting at the police office seemed to have not been a dream. And Neo felt as if he was being sucked deeper into the secret of the answer to the question:  
What is The Matrix?

Or something like that. I dunno.

Author's Notes: There. This should make up for my last story's length. Please review!


	4. Morpheus

Chapter 4: Morpheus 

The car had stopped in front of an abandoned warehouse. Trinity had shown Neo through the warehouse to a room on the top floor. She pushed open the doors, and her and Neo walked in to the room. It was a large room, with two chairs in the middle, and a tall window on the opposite side. A man was looking out side the window, at the stormy grey sky. He had no doubt heard the door open, but he did not move from the window.

There was a long pause.

"Morpheus?" called Trinity.

No answer.

"Morpheus!"

Again, no answer.

"_Morpheus!"_

The man at the window now looked up and yelped, as if he was startled.

"Oh, I'm sorry," said the man. "I fell asleep there for a second."

Neo frowned. The man turned to Neo.

"Hello, Neo. As you may have guessed, I'm Morpheus."  
"No, I hadn't guessed that."  
"You hadn't?"  
"No."  
"Well, I am Morpheus. Now, for my long metaphorical speech. Sit down."

Neo and Morpheus sat opposite each other on the chairs.

"Have you ever had a dream, Neo," said Morpheus, "That you couldn't wake up from? How would you know the difference between the dream world and the real world?"  
"I wouldn't."  
"I know. It was a rhetorical question."  
"Oh."  
"Moron."  
"Hey!"

"Anyway, as I was saying...do you believe in fate, Neo?"

"Yes."

"Wha...? You do?"

"Yeah. Sure."  
"No! You're supposed to say 'no', so I can continue with my creepy, boring speech!"  
"Oh. Sorry."

"Okay, let's try this again: do you believe in fate, Neo?"

"No."

"Why not?"  
"Because I don't like the idea that I don't control what happens in my life."  
"I know _exactly _how you feel!"

"No, you don't."  
"Yes, I do."  
"Not _exactly_."  
"Huh?"  
"You don't know how it feels to touch my nose with my tongue."  
Neo touched his nose with his tongue.

"I'll show you!"

Morpheus tried to touch his nose with his tongue. It didn't work.

"Son of a...anyway, okay, as I was saying. Let me tell you why you're here. You're here because you know something. What you know, you can't explain, but you feel it. You've felt it your entire life, that there's something wrong with the world. You don't know what it is, but it's there, like a splinter in your mind, driving you mad. It is this feeling that has brought you to me. Do you know what I'm talking about?"  
"Umm...Dollywood?"

"Stupid—no!"

"The Matrix?"

"Yes, moron. Do you want to know what The Matrix is?"

"Meh."

"The Matrix is everywhere. It is all around us. Even now, in this very room. You can see it when you look out your window or when you turn on your television. You can feel it when you go to work... when you go to church... when you pay your taxes. It is the world that has been pulled over your eyes to blind you from the truth."

"What truth?"

"That you are a slave, Neo. Like everyone else you were born into bondage. Into a prison that you cannot taste or see or touch. A prison for your mind."  
"Whoa. Creepy."  
"Very. Now, you probably feel like Alice. Tumbling down the rabbit hole."  
"No, I don't. I feel like Neo, sitting in the leather chair."

"You stupid—it was a metaphor!"

"Man, this scene is confusing."  
"Yeah, what were the Wachowskis thinking with all these metaphor?"

"No sense at all."

"Anyway, I'm going to offer you a choice."  
Morpheus held up his left hand. In his palm was a blue pill.

"You take the blue pill, and you wake up in your bed, and you believe...whatever you want to believe."

Morpheus held up his right hand. In his palm was a red pill.

"But you take the red pill, and you stay in Wonderland and see how far the rabbit hole goes."  
There was a pause. Neo thought, and said, "I'll take the blue pill."  
"What? You're taking the blue pill? But—don't you want to find out what The Matrix is?"

"Mmm...nah."

"Stupid script...fine, take the blue pill."  
Neo took the blue pill, drank a glass of water on the table beside him, and swallowed the pill. Neo paused and looked down.

"Whoa!"

"Oh, I'm sorry. That wasn't the blue Matrix pill, it was a Viagra pill."

"Sweet!"

"Well, you still have to choose a pill, and since the blue pill is gone, I guess you'll have to take the red one."

"_Fine."_

Neo took the red pill, drank the water, and swallowed it.

"Okay," said Morpheus. "Time to go. Follow me."

Morpheus and Neo walked to a door at the end of the room. They walked through it, and in it, Neo saw a bunch of people sitting at computers. He recognised three of them as Trinity, the woman in the car, and the man in the car. He did not recognise the four other ones.

"Sit down," said Morpheus, motioning to a large chair that looked like a dentist's chair. Neo sat down in it. Trinity began attaching electrodes from a machine next to the chair all over Neo's head."

"The pill you took is part of a trace program. It's designed to disrupt your input/output carrier signal so we can pinpoint your location."

"Umm...I'm going to pretend I understood that."

"It means buckle your seatbelt, Dorothy, 'cause Kansas is goin' bye-bye."

"Who asked you, Baldy?"

"Shut up! It's genetic!"

Neo looked to his side. There was a mirror there. The mirror looked somehow...strange. Neo put his hand to the mirror. It felt like touching slime. He pulled his fingers away from the mirror. The mirror stuck to his hand for a moment like a piece of mozzarella cheese on a pizza, and then snapped back with a large ripple. Neo looked at his hand. There was glass on his hand, but the glass was like slime on his fingertips. He stared at the slime glass for a moment, and then felt the slime glass growing and oozing onto his hand, then his wrist, then his arm.

"OH GOD! HELP ME! MIRROR SLIME! MIRROR SLIME!"

"Tank, find a signal," said Morpheus.

"I'm trying," said a man at one of the computers. "I don't see one..."

"JESUS CHRIST! IT FEELS COLD AND WET AND STUFF! IT'S ON MY ARM! IT'S ON MY ARM! EWWW!"

"Come on," urged Trinity."  
"I've almost got it," said the man named Tank. "One second..."

Morpheus was speaking into a cell phone.

"Now, Tank."

The glass slime began going up Neo's neck.  
"One...second...got it!"

The glass slime was on Neo's face.

"Now!" said Morpheus

Suddenly, everything Neo saw went black.

When Neo woke up, he felt a strange feeling. He looked around. He was in a strange glass jar, about the size of a bathtub. The jar was filled with sticky red goo. It was like a preservative. In fact, that was exactly what it was.

He bolted straight up. He looked at himself. He was entirely without clothes and hair, and he had all sorts of electrodes attached to his head. He looked again, and saw that all sorts of wires were plugged into strange sockets all around him. He paused, and looked to his side. He saw a huge row of glass jars just like the one he was in, each with a person in it, each just like Neo, without hair or clothes, with electrodes stuck on their heads. He looked around, and saw that his jar and the row of jars around him was just one row of gigantic towers with hundreds of ledges on the side, each ledge with a row of people jars on them. He looked around. All he could see, as far as he looked, were these strange towers, each with thousands of human jars on them. With all the towers he saw, the entire population of the world had to have been in this strange place. They were all kept in these jars, unconscious, the electrodes on their head telling them that they were not in a jar, in a tower, in a horrible, dark place filled with the human jars, but telling them that they were at home, where Neo was a few minutes ago. Earth. Or so he thought.

"Wow...this was unexpected..."

Just then, a strange floating robot came up from wherever the ground was and right up in front of Neo. A strange metal arm reached out from the robot and clamped around Neo's neck. It lifted him out of his jar, leaving him dangling above the ground. For a moment, Neo thought that he would die, but that's when the robot's other arm took out the electrodes from his head and ripped the wires from the sockets, and dropped him back into the tub. There was a pause, and then a tiny door opened up on the wall of the tower behind Neo's tub. The sticky red goo rushed out of the tub, carrying Neo with in. Neo fell through the door, and he felt a humongous fall as he soared through the hollow interior of the tower. Luckily, he did not hit the ground. He hit water. But he did pass out from falling so deep into water, and was not conscious to see another robot come down from a hole in the ceiling, pick him up, and carry him off.

When Neo woke up, he was lying on some sort of bed. He could hear Morpheus and Trinity's voice.

"Am I dead?" he murmured.

"Far from it," replied Morpheus.

"Then what am I?"

"Right now, you are..."  
Neo passed out again.

_Damn, _though Neo.

When Neo woke up again, he was on a table with thousands of tiny needles stuck in his body. Morpheus was there, with another man that Neo remembered from the computer room at the warehouse. Morpheus and the other man were carefully removing all of the needles from Neo. When they were done, Neo asked, "Where am I?"

"You are in the real world," responded Morpheus.

"Why do my eyes hurt?"  
"Because you've never used them before."

"Yes, I have."

"No, you haven't."  
"Yes, I have!"

"No, you haven't!"

"$20 bucks says I have!"  
"Your on!"

Morpheus led Neo to small room with a cot in it. Neo sat down on the cot.

"What's going on here?"

"I will tell you tomorrow. Get some sleep. Not that you ever have before."  
"That $20 is mine!"

Morpheus had already closed the door.

"That $20 is mine..." murmured Neo, and he fell asleep.

Author's Notes: The plot thickens! See how the bet ends tomorrow!


	5. The Matrix

**Chapter 5: The Matrix**

When Neo had woken up, Morpheus had taken him through a hallway to a small room. Wherever Neo was, it seemed that he was on a spaceship. Neo was placed in a chair, and had several electrodes placed on him by the other people he saw at the warehouse. The people worked on a few computers for a few moments, and everything went black.

When Neo woke up, he was in a room, but it was a strange room. It was perfectly white everywhere and did not seem to have any walls or ceiling. It just was empty white space.

"Cool!" said Neo. "It's like I'm in a car commercial!"

Morpheus was in the strange room, too.

"Good morning, Neo."  
"Hey, Morpheus."

"Are you ready to find out what The Matrix is?"  
"Yes."  
"Sit down, and I'll tell you."

"How can I? There aren't any chairs."  
Just then, Neo turned to his side. There were to chairs beside him.

"GAH!" he screamed. "THIS IS TOTALLY CREEPIN' ME OUT, MAN!"

"Sit down."

Neo paused, and sat down in one of the chairs. Morpheus sat in the other.

"The Matrix is not real, Neo," said Morpheus. "It is a cyber-dreamworld designed to hide you from the real world. You believe that right now, it is the year 1999. This is what you think the world looks like."

Morpheus and Neo turned to their side. There was now a television beside them. Morpheus held up a remote that had appeared in his hand and pressed a button. Film of the world Neo knew began to play on the screen. Film of the great cities of the world. Skyscrapers, office buildings, metropolises. The world Neo knew.

"But the truth is, the year is more actually 2199. We're not exactly sure what year it is. Apoc lost our calendar a few weeks ago.

"Any way, this is what the world really looks like."

Morpheus pressed a different button on the remote, and more film began playing. Film of a terrible world. A thick layer of smoke hung in the air. Entire cities were burnt and destroyed, crumbling to the ground. The skies were wrought with gas and smoke. It was a horrible sight. Neo stared at the screen, not understanding what he saw. He paused, and looked around. Him, Morpheus, the two chairs and the television had somehow got into this terrible world. Neo looked around at the rocky ground, and looked up and saw the destroyed city he saw in the film.

"Welcome to the desert of real," said Morpheus.

Neo paused, and looked around. They were back in the white room.

"At the height of the 21st century, the world found the dawning of a new age—the age of artificial intelligence. But the machines that used this power took it too far, and they enslaved humanity. No one thought that with the environmental disasters that were happening that the sun, which was no longer shining on earth, that the machines could no longer survive without a power source as strong as the sun. But the machines found a power source strong enough to fuel them: the natural energy that comes from humans. So, the machines created a computer program called The Matrix. It was so advanced, that it made the brains of all the humans on earth believe that they were not in the present, enslaved by the machines, but it made them believe that they were back in the 21st century, at the peak of civilization. These machines have been mining the humans out of their energy for years now, and only a few of us know what the real world is like.

"When The Matrix was first made, a person was born inside it. This person was called The One. He selected me and a hand few of others, and brought us to the real world. He told us the truth about the earth, and he showed us the place where the humans were now being created. I saw that humans were no longer born, but grown in "fields" that stretched on for miles. I did not believe the truth about the world until I saw the fields with my own eyes. I saw the dead bodies of the humans being melted down, and the tissue of the bodies being re-formed and creating new humans. That is when I realised the truth of the world. That is when I knew that the entire earth was been digitally simulated to keep the people from knowing that the machines are turning them from a human into this."

Morpheus held up a battery.

"Oh, I'm sorry, what?" said Neo. "I wasn't listening. The author went so long without a joke that I got bored and stopped paying attention."

"Stupid unfunny scene..." muttered Morpheus. "Making the author waste 5 paragraphs on serious stuff..."

"Hey! A battery! Thanks!"

Neo grabbed the battery Morpheus was holding, took a Game Boy out of his pocket, put the battery in, and began playing.

"Hey! Cut that out!" Morpheus slapped the Game Boy out of Neo's hands.

"Sorry," said Neo. "So, the whole world is just an elaborate sham designed the shield the human race from knowing that we're being farmed for our energy by robots?"  
"Correct."  
"Man, that sucks."  
"Totally."  
"So, everything I think I've done is just The Matrix telling my brain I've done it, and I haven't really done anything I thought I've done?"  
"Yes."

"Aww, man! I'm never gonna get a date..."

"Ha-ha. Also, I believe that there was a little matter of the $20 bucks, so, if you could just cough it up..."

Neo groaned and handed Morpheus a 20.

"Okay, there. Now, where am I, anyway?"

"You are in a place called The Construct. It is a computer program not unlike The Matrix we use to get things. Our technicians can load anything here from training programs to weapon utility."

"Cool."

"We shall start your training tomorrow."  
"Sweet."

Everything went black for a few seconds, and then Neo found himself back in the strange computer room.

"Okay, where am I now?" asked Neo.

"You are in the real world, on my ship, The Nebucadnezzar. It's a hovercraft. We patrol the city using the sewer system."

"And, what city is that?"  
"It's called Zion. It's an underground city. It's the last human city in existence. The entire population of earth lives there. Of course, there are only about a thousand people who have been unplugged from The Matrix, so it is a small city. Any, we live underground for two reasons. One—because underground is close to the earth's core, so Zion is pretty much the only warm place left on earth. Also, we use it to hide from the machines that patrol the world. If the machines found out about Zion, the human race would go bye-bye."

"And...that's bad?"

"That's ba...? YES, OF COURSE IT'S BAD!"

"Sorry! Don't have to yell..."

"Anyway, it's time to show you the crewmembers of my ship."

He motioned to Trinity.

"You already know Trinity, of course, so I'll show you the ones you don't know."

He motioned to three other crewmembers.

"This is Switch."

He motioned to the young woman with short blond hair from the car.

"This is Apoc."  
He motioned to the young man who had been driving the car.

"This is Cypher."

He motioned to the man with a goatee and no hair who Neo had spoken to at the warehouse.

"This is Tank and his brother Dozer."

He motioned to two large, strong looking men. They smiled at Neo.

"And the little one behind you is Mouse."  
Neo turned around. A little man who looked a few years younger than Neo was standing behind him.

"Hi," said Mouse.

"Well, now that you've met everyone, I think it's time to go to sleep," Morpheus told Neo. "You've got a big day of training tomorrow."

Morpheus led Neo back to his cot. Neo sat down on his bed.

"This whole 'the world not being real' thing really creeps me out."  
"I know. I'm sorry. I know how fragile someone's thoughts can be. The mind has trouble letting go."

Morpheus began to walk off. After he closed the door to Neo's bedroom, he murmured to himself, "Yes! I got the $20!"

The next morning, Neo got out of bed and rested his head against the wall, thinking about all the things he now knew. After a few minutes, the man named Tank walked in to the room.

"Hey, the new recruit! Something wrong?"  
"It's just that all the things I've learned are too much for me."  
"I know. It's hard to understand when you first find out. But you get over it. Anyway, as you already know, I'm Tank."  
"Neo."

They shook hands.

Neo looked at Tank for a second. Unlike himself, he had no Matrix plug sockets all over him.

"Hey, no holes.

"Yup!" said Tank happily. "Me and my brother Dozer are 100 percent human, born and raised in the real world!"

"Lucky."  
"No, it's not! The pizza in the real world tastes _awful!_ That's one of the reasons me and Dozer joined Morpheus."

"I see."

"Anyway, today is the day you learn your training. Come with me."

Tank took Neo back to the Control room. He strapped him into the chair and attached some electrodes to him and plugged a wire into the socket on the back of his neck. Tank sat down at a hair behind a computer.  
"We're supposed to start off with basic operating programs, but that's major boring shit, so—"

"Wait—operating? You mean, I'm gonna be a surgeon?"

"What? No, no, no! I'm not even gonna do the operating programs. Let's start with something a little more interesting: combat training."

Tank took out a small disc and put it into the disc drive. The words "Combat Training—Ju Jitsu" appeared on the screen.

"Ju jitsu?" said Neo. "I'm gonna learn ju jitsu?"

"Yup. Here we go."

Tank pressed some buttons on the computer, and all the information on the tiny combat training disc flooded through the electrodes and into Neo's brain.

Neo looked up. He suddenly knew everything there is to know about ju jitsu. Somehow, in about five seconds, Neo had become a martial arts expert.

"Whoa!" cried Neo. "I know ju jitsu!"

"Hey, Mikey, I think he likes it!" yelled Tank. "You want more?"

"Hell, yeah!"

"Well, I'm not gonna give you it."

"Aww..."

Later, Morpheus came into the control room. He saw that Tank was watching a computer screen very carefully.

"How's he doing?" asked Morpheus.

"He's a machine! He's already got 20 guys out!"

Tank was watching a screen that displayed whatever was in The Construct, watching Neo virtually knock out 20 guys using his new-found martial arts skills.

"HE'S A MACHINE? KILL HIM!"

Morpheus ran up to Neo, took out a knife, and just as he was going to slit Neo's throat, Tank yelled, "Stop! He's a figurative machine!"

Morpheus paused.

"I knew that..."

After a few minutes, Morpheus had transported himself into The Construct. He had pre-set it so that when he came in to see Neo, the two of them were inside a large Construct gymnasium.

"The Matrix, Neo, is a computer program, with rules, just as all others. But, you being a hacker, should know that program's rules can be broken, and reality can be bent."

Morpheus ran up to the wall, and ran across it, horizontally, as if gravity was facing sideways.

"Like that."

"Neat!"

"Very."

Morpheus and Neo began to have a huge kung-fu action sequence with cool techno music and stuff like that.

The whole fight, Neo had been doing pretty good defending Morpheus's attacks, but when it came to attacks, somehow Morpheus seemed to defend them with more ease than humanly possible.

Meanwhile, back on the Nebucadnezzar, the little guy named Mouse noticed the fight raging on the screen. He ran over to the galley where everyone was eating.

"Hey, everybody! Neo's fighting Morpheus!"

Him and everyone else ran up to the screen.

"Amazing!" murmured Mouse as he watched Neo. Not many people could go this long in a fight against Morpheus without losing.

After a few minutes of fighting, there was a pause.

"Why can't you defeat me?" asked Morpheus.

"Because you're too strong," replied Neo, who was gasping for breath.

"Do you think that me being strong or fast has anything to do with it? Do you think that's _air _you're breathing right now?"

Neo looked up.

"Then what am I breathing? Chocolate pie?"

Neo burst into laughter.

"Uh...yeah...you're right...it's _not _chocolate pudding..." murmured Morpheus nervously. "Not chocolate pudding at all...no..."  
Neo had now got his breath back. He and Morpheus continued to fight just as they had before. Neo not losing, yet not winning.

"Come on, Neo!" said Morpheus in mid-fight, in an almost taunting tone. "You're faster than this! Stop trying to hit me and hit me!"

A fist came flying at Morpheus's face. Neo's fist. It stopped about two inches from him.

"Impressive," said Morpheus, and then he said in a loud voice, "Tank, load the Jump program!"

Back in the real world, Tank took out the Combat Practice CD and put in the Jump Program CD.

Morpheus and Neo now found themselves on a roller coaster.

"What the? Tank, what happened?" yelled Morpheus.

"Oh, sorry," said Tank into a microphone on the computer. I accidentally put in my Roller Coaster Tycoon 2 CD instead of the Jump CD. My bad."  
Tank put in a different CD.

Morpheus and Neo now found themselves on a skyscraper high above a busy street.

"Clear you mind, Neo, and you can do anything you want," said Morpheus, and then, with a leap that should have only got him two feet forward, flew through the air and landed on the skyscraper across the street—a physically impossible jump.

Meanwhile, back in the Nebucadnezzar, the crewmembers watched The Construct screen with anticipation.

"What if he makes it?" asked Mouse.

"He's not gonna make it," said Apoc. "No one ever does."  
"Yeah, I know, but still...what if he does?"

"He's not going to, okay?"

"But what if he does?"

"HE'S NOT GOING TO!"

"HE MIGHT!"  
"HE WON'T!"  
"HE MIGHT!"  
"HE WON'T!"  
"YOU WANNA BRING THIS OUTSIDE?"  
"I'LL TAKE YOU ON ANY DAY!"

Meanwhile, in the Jump program...

"Whoa," murmured Neo upon seeing Morpheus's jump. "Okay, clear my mind...okey dokey...here we go...cleared my mind...mind is clear...mind no-clear no-no...'kay, here we go..."

He ran up to the edge of the skyscraper and leaped forward.

"WEEEEEEEEeeeeeee.......!"  
Of course, the fun of flying through the air was short lived, for Neo now saw that he was about to hit the ground.  
"AHHHHHHH——!"

Just then, as Neo hit the ground, he realised that he would not die, because the ground suddenly seemed to be made out of slime or something, and he just bounced back out into the air.

"Cool! It's like Jell-O!"

Just then, Neo came back from being flung 15 feet in the air and landed flat on the ground, which was now hard again.

"Cool! It's like concrete!"

Neo was then transported back into the chair in the control room. He felt his mouth with his hand. It was bleeding; it was as if what had happened in The Construct had actually happened.

"I though The Construct and The Matrix weren't real."

"The mind makes it real," said Morpheus.  
"Um...yeah, that makes a lot of sense...anyway, so, if you die in The Matrix, do you die in the real world?"  
"The body cannot live without the mind."  
"Yeah...I'll take that as a yes."

Neo headed back into his bed.

"I am _so _gonna get that $20 bucks back."

Author's Notes: Tomorrow, The Oracle! Today, review!


	6. The Oracle

Author's Notes: Okay, my memory of what happens after this is kind of fuzzy, so if you find any mistakes, don't, you know, tell me.

**Chapter 6: The Oracle**

Morning. Nebucadnezzar. Morpheus decided that Neo was ready to be taken back into The Matrix.

Five minutes later. Neo and Morpheus were inside a street in The Matrix. Morpheus was explaining more about The Matrix to him.

"The Matrix is a system, Neo. And that system is our enemy."

"We're enemies against software?"  
"Yes."  
"So...we're like an anti-virus program?"  
"In essence."  
"Cool!"  
"Anyway...when you're in The Matrix, look around. What do you see? Businessmen, lawyers, teachers, carpenters."

"Actually, all I see is a bunch of people that all look strangely similar."  
"Man...Tank is definitely not getting that raise..."

"What?"

"Nothing. Anyway, most of these people are not ready to be unplugged from The Matrix. Some of them are so attached, so hopelessly dependant on it, that they will fight to protect it."  
Just then, a gorgeous woman in a scarlet dress walked by. She smiled at Neo.

"Are you listening to me, Neo, or are you looking at the woman in the red dress?"  
"No, I wasn't undressing her with my mind, if that's what you mean!" he said nervously.

"Look again."  
"Morpheus! You sly old dog!"

Neo turned around. The woman in the red dress was no longer standing there. Agent Smith was standing there, with a gun aimed at Neo head.

"HOLY SH—!"

"Freeze it!" called Morpheus the second before the shot was fired. Everything around them froze instantaneously; the people, the birds, the water in the fountain—all perfectly still, even Agent Smith.

"You mean...this isn't The Matrix?"  
"No. It is—"

"You _lied _to me?"  
"Yes."  
"I hate you!"

"Likewise. Now, as I was saying, this is another training program designed to teach you one thing: if you are not one of us, then you are one of them."  
"How does making me think that Agent Smith is about to blow my brains out teach me that?"  
"I dunno. It's another metaphor."  
"Of course."

Later, Trinity and Cypher stood in the control room, talking about the psychic of the unplugged humans, The Oracle.

"If Morpheus really believes that Neo's The One, then how come he hasn't taken him to see The Oracle yet?" asked Cypher.

"I dunno," Trinity shrugged. "He'll take Neo there when he's ready."

"And when Hell freezes over."  
"But Hell did freeze over, in 2134, remember?"  
"Oh, yeah. Well, you just knew the guys who operated the snow making machines at the skiing resorts would snap someday."  
"Anyway, it's breakfast time. We should go."  
"Oh, now it's _we_, is it?"  
When Neo woke up, he was told that it was breakfast, and he was shown to the galley, which was a small room with nothing but a table and few chairs, and a weird machine that made some sort of food that looked like yogurt.

"There you go," said Tank, as he handed Neo a can of the strange food. "'Breakfast of Champions'. If you close your eyes, it kind of tastes like runny eggs!"

"Yeah, and shit," muttered Apoc.

"No, it doesn't! I know what shit tastes like!"

"Umm..."

"And, this stuff has all the vital nutrients and vitamins the body needs!"  
"I feel like I'm in a cereal commercial."

"Wanna know what this reminds me of?" asked the little guy named Mouse to Neo. "Tasty wheat! You ever had tasty wheat?"

"No," said Switch, "But technically, neither have you."  
"That's exactly my point! What if the Matrix computers got it wrong, and tasty wheat doesn't taste like tasty wheat at all, it tastes like macaroni and mustard?"

"Macaroni and mustard? What the hell does that mean?"  
"It's a very tasty French delicacy, macaroni and mustard!" replied Mouse.

"No, it's not."

"Well, in some Caribbean countries—"

Just then, Morpheus walked in.

"Neo, I'm taking you to see The Oracle!" he announced.

"Okay, never mind," said Cypher.

After a few minutes, Neo and Morpheus had gotten into the _real _Matrix, and were going to go The Oracle's apartment.

When they got to the apartment building and were going up the elevator to The Oracle's apartment, Neo asked, "So, who is The Oracle?"  
"The Oracle is a physic," replied Morpheus, "And a very wise one at that. They are very old, and has helped the humans many times."

"Have you gone to The Oracle before?"  
"Yup."  
"What'd they say?"  
"They said that I would leave her apartment within the next hour."  
"And did you?"  
"Yes."  
"Oh my god! The Oracle _is _a psychic!"

"Yeah. Trippy. They also said that I would find The One."  
"Che-ah, right! Like that's gonna happen!

Then, the elevator stopped at The Oracle's floor. Neo and Morpheus got out, and Morpheus led Neo through the hallway to their apartment. When they got to the door, they stopped.

"I can only show you the door," said Morpheus. "It is up to you to walk through it."  
"Can you talk in any other way than metaphors?"  
"No, not really."  
"I can see why the agents hate you."  
Neo opened the door. There was a young woman standing in the inside.

"You must be Neo," she said to him.

"You'd think so, but no," said Neo.

"What are you talking about, moron?" snapped Morpheus. "Of course, you're Neo!"

"Oh, yeah. I forgot. Yes, you're right, I'm Neo."  
"Come with me."  
Neo followed the woman into the apartment living room.

"You can wait in here, with the other potentials."  
Neo looked around. He saw that the room was filled with children. On the ground, on the chairs, on the couches. They were all doing something intellectual. Some were reading, some were writing, and some seemed to be straight-out paranormal. He saw two little girls sitting on the ground. One of them was playing with blocks, but she was not touching them. She was causing them to float in mid-air. She appeared to be telekinetic. The girl next to her seemed to be telekinetic, too, because she took over the job of floating the blocks back onto the ground.

"SON OF A BICTH!" screamed Neo. "HOW THE HELL DID YOU DO THAT?"

The girls did not answer.

"Okay, fine!" snapped Neo. "Be that way! Don't tell me! I mean, it's not even that hard to figure out how to do it! I can do it, too! Watch!"

He grabbed one of the blocks, and thought as hard as he could.

"Come...on...stupid...block...fly!"

But the block stayed still. Neo groaned, and through the block to the ground.

"Stupid block...kill it in it's sleep..."  
He looked over and saw another telekinetic child. He was holding a spoon. He stared at the spoon with great concentration, and the spoon seemed to twist and bend and turn itself into strange positions, without it even being touched. The boy saw that Neo was watching him. He handed Neo a normal spoon.

"Do not try to bend the spoon," said the boy. "That is impossible. Only try to realise the truth—there _is _no spoon."  
"There is no spoon?"  
"There is no spoon."  
"Yes, there is, I'm holding it in my hand, right now."  
"No, you only think there is a spoon. It is a Matrix spoon, not a real spoon. So, in essence, there _is _no spoon."  
"Oh, right. One of those 'the-world-not-being-real' things. Gotcha."

"Okay, now that you know that there's no spoon, you can bend the spoon."  
"Bend the non-existent spoon?"  
"Yes."  
"That makes no sense at all, but...whatever."

He stared at the spoon, muttering to himself, "There is no spoon...there is no spoon..." Suddenly, the spoon began to bend by itself.

"Oh, sweet! I can bend spoons by looking at it!"

He turned to the two little girls.

"See?" he yelled at them. "_This _kid is nice! He _tells _me how to do magic stuff!"  
"But the spoon doesn't exist," said the boy.

"I know!" said Neo. "That's why I can bend it!"  
"But if you bent a non-existent object, then you didn't bend anything, did you?" asked the boy.

"Well...okay, now I hate you."

The young woman came into the room.

"The Oracle is ready to see you, Neo," she said. Neo got up, and the young woman led him to the apartment kitchen. Inside, a woman was standing there. She was very old, yes, but she did not look like a psychic. She looked like a kindly old grandmother. She wore a pair of over mitts, and was looking at the oven. Without even turning to see who it was, she said, "You're Neo."  
"Yes, I am. How did you know that?"  
"Because I'm psychic."  
"Oh, yeah. Jesus..."  
"What?"  
"It's just...I thought you were a man."  
"Most guys do," said The Oracle.

"Déjà vu!" said Neo.

She took out a cigarette, lit it, and sat down. She paused, and then said, "Your cuter than I thought. No wonder she likes you."  
"Who?"  
"Not too bright, though."  
"Are you insulting my intelligence?"

"Umm...no?"

"Oh, okay. Just checking."  
"Now, I'd ask you to sit down, but you wouldn't, anyway."  
"You don't know me," he snapped.  
"Oh, and don't worry about the vase."  
"What vase?"  
Neo looked around to find a vase. He didn't see one at first, but he sure noticed one after he accidentally knocked a vase over a few seconds later.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!"  
"Don't worry about it. Now pick it up."  
"No!"

"Fine! You don't get a slice of cake!"  
"Aww..."

"Anyway, let me take a look at you."

She walked up to Neo and looked at his palm.  
"Hmm..." she said. "I should say, 'That's interesting, but...' now, but then you would say..."  
There was a long pause.

"Then, you would say, 'But what?', stupid!" finished The Oracle.

"Yeah, that sounds like me!"

"Anyway, you know what's interesting, don't you?"  
"Umm...cuckoo clocks are pretty interesting."

"Um...no. Try again."  
"Um...I'm not The One?"  
"Bingo," said The Oracle. "You've got the talent, but not right in this lifetime."  
"When, then?"  
"I dunno. Maybe in a hundred years. These things are hard to predict."

"Oh..."  
"Sorry, kid. Listen, here's a cookie." She handed him a cookie. "It's no cake, but I guarantee that by the time you finish eating that cookie, you'll feel better."

But Neo was already finished eating the cookie.

"I still feel bad."  
"Not my problem. Now get out of my apartment."

Neo walked to the door and out of the apartment. Morpheus was waiting in the hallway. Neo was about to tell him that he wasn't The One, when Morpheus said, "What The Oracle told you is between her and you, and her and you alone."

"Oh. Well, okay, then I won't tell you that she said—"

"LALALALA! I'M NOT LISTENING! LALALALALA! I CAN'T HEAR YOU!"

Neo stared at him.

Later. The Matrix. A fancy restaurant. Cypher was there to meet Agent Smith, to arrange a deal.

"I believe we have arranged a deal," said Agent Smith.

"You know what?" said Cypher, as he held up a piece of steak on his fork, "When I put this piece of steak in my mouth, The Matrix will tell me that it is chewy and juicy and cooked to perfection. And, after 9 years in the real world, I've realised one thing."

There was a long pause.

"And...that is?" asked Smith.

"I dunno. I just know that I've realised something. I forget what it is."

"This is going to be a long night..."

"Oh, yeah! Ignorance is bliss!" said Cypher. He paused, and then added, "I've also realised that when I was told I was going to go into the real world that I wasn't signing up for a reality show."

"Umm...anyway..."  
"Yeah, I want to be plugged back in. I don't want to remember anything, and I want to be something important...like an actor..."  
"Anything you want, Mr. Reagan."

"Or maybe the president..."

"Now, I need the access codes to the Zion mainframe."  
"I told you, I forgot them! But I know someone who wrote it down on a post-it note."

"Okay, _now _we have a deal."  
"And I want a cool car!"  
"Sure."  
"And a hot girlfriend!"  
"Whatever."

"And lots of money!"

"Fine."  
"And a big, expensive house!"  
"Okay, now you're getting annoying."

"And a big-screen T.V.!"

"You want me to use this gun on you?"  
"If you give me a big-screen T.V., I don't care!"

_BANG!_

"Okay, now all I want is an ambulance."

"That, I can do."

Author's Notes: Sorry that this was so short. I didn't have much material for this chapter. More tomorrow. Please review.


	7. A Lot of Stuff Happening at Once

Author's Notes: One—okay, after consulting a script of The Matrix, I realised that I've left a lot of stuff out. For instance, the two following scenes. So, totally disregard what happens for the next two scenes having anything to do with the story. Two—there following scenes contain explicit language during some scenes, so, if you don't think you can handle it, read it anyway. I mean, it's not gonna kill ya...probably. Three—this is my longest chapter yet, so get ready to be reading for a while. Finally, four—I am sorry that I missed putting this chapter up yesterday. I was busy, and did not have a lot of time to do write it. But, it's up now, don't worry.

**Chapter 7: A Lot of Stuff Happening at Once (I can't think of a good title for this chapter)**

There seemed to be trouble aboard the Nebucadnezzar. Neo was not quite sure what was going on, but everyone was in the control room, looking very nervous.

"Sorry, I fell asleep there," said Neo. "What'd I miss?"  
"There are some squids near here," said Apoc, as he examined one of the computer screens.  
"Squids? What does that mean?" he asked.

"It means buckle your seatbelt, Dorothy, 'cause Kansas in goin' bye-bye."

"Hey, you already used that line!"  
"Oh, yeah."  
"Learn your lines, Cypher," said Trinity. "Anyway, squid is a nickname for a Sentinel, which are robots that are designed for one thing."  
"What's that?"

"Search and destroy."

"Uh-oh. That doesn't sound too good."

"Also, they advertise for Arby's restaurants."  
"Oh, god! This is awful!"

"How long until they find us, Tank?" asked Morpheus.  
"I'd say about...two minutes."

"Uh-oh."

"Oh, I'm sorry. One minute. My watch is broke."

"Oh, this has gone from bad to worse!" cried Morpheus. "Do we have an EMP ready?"  
"Fully loaded," replied Tank.

"Good."  
"EMP?" asked Neo.

"Electro-Magnetic Pulse," replied Trinity. "It's a wave of electricity that shuts down any electronics in the area."  
"Electricity makes electronics shut off?"

"Yes."  
"That makes no sense."  
"Neither does any of this movie, but try to pay attention."  
"Shut up!" snapped Morpheus.

"You shut up!"

"Fire the EMP."  
"Okay, one second..."

There was the sound of the Nebucadnezzar powering off.

VVVVVVvvvvvv... 

"_Okay, be very quiet," _said Trinity. _"I'm hunting wabbits."_

"_You're talking by telling me to be quiet, so you should be quiet, too."  
"You be quiet!"  
"No, you!"_

"_Shut up!"  
"You shut up!"_

"_You wanna go?"  
"All take you on any day, wimp! You think you're so cool just 'cause you got a cookie from The Oracle!"_

"_Seriously, guys, be quiet!" _snapped Morpheus.

The crew of the Nebucadnezzar stared out the window of the cockpit, and saw a horrible machine. It had tentacles swinging out of it like whips, spikes jutting out of it like a warning to not get too close near it, a dozen red, glaring robotic eyes, and a large sign saying, "Arby's New Market Fresh Sandwiches! They Taste Good!"

"_GAAH!"_ screamed Neo. _"Apostle of the Devil!"_

"_Be quiet!" _snapped Morpheus.

There was a long pause.  
"Okay, it's gone."

"Good. Now, as I was saying, I deserved that cookie!"

Cypher sat alone in the control room, working on the computers. He didn't hear Neo walk up.

"Hey, Cypher, is it okay if I use your toothbrush? I dropped mine in the toilet."

"GAH! Neo, don't sneak up on a guy like that!"

"Sorry."  
"Now, what were you saying about my toothbrush? No, you can't use it!"  
"Oh, well, I already did. I just wanted to see if you cared."  
"Um..."  
"So, what's that on the screen?"  
"That's my screensaver."  
"Cool! What are all those symbols?"

"Actually, I programmed it to display the words 'Cypher is Cool' over and over again, but it messed up, so now it's just a bunch of Japanese symbols. Stupid language packs..."  
"You need to get Windows."

"Yeah...anyway, want a drink?"  
"No."  
"Well, I'll give it to you anyway."  
Cypher handed Neo a glass of some clear drink. Neo drank it.

"Man, this tastes horrible! What is this? Engine greaser?"

"No, it's Sprite from Arby's."  
"Okay, I think the Arby's joke has gotten kinda stale."  
"I agree. Well, the author couldn't think of any other joke."

"Oh."  
"Hey, did Morpheus tell you why you're hear?"  
"He says that I'm The One."  
"You're not the first. So far, I've seen five people that Morpheus believed was The One get killed by agents."

"Well...maybe that's 'cause they weren't One-ish enough."  
"Haha. You're cute, but no. If you see an agents, do what we do and run."  
"Will do!"

"That's the spirit! When the going gets tough, the tough run away from computer programs!"

Author's Notes: Okay, back on track. From here on in, I'm starting from the part right after Neo, Morpheus, and for some reason, everyone else, are leaving The Oracle's apartment building.

As Neo, Morpheus, and for some reason, everyone else, walked down the stairs to the ground floor, Neo looked over and saw a cat walked past a doorway. A few seconds later, another cat walked by that looked just like it.

"Déjà vu," said Neo.  
"What did you say?" asked Trinity nervously.

"I just had déjà vu."  
"Oh, no."  
"What?"

"Déjà vu is a glitch in The Matrix. It's usually caused when they change something."

"Like, the outcome of the Nicks game?"  
"Um...no."  
"Damn. I had money on that game."

"Moron."

"I know what it is," said Morpheus. "Let's go!"

"Well, I had déjà vu at The Oracle's apartment, too."  
"You did? Okay, then we have to kill The Oracle."

Meanwhile, Mouse, for some unexplained reason, was sitting on a couch in some fancy room in the building looking at a porno photo of the woman in the red dress.

Just then, Mouse's cell phone rung.

"Mouse," said Morpheus' voice, "Neo had déjà vu. Get out of there right now."

Mouse's eyes darted up. He knew that the agents would be coming to the door, so he needed to get to the window. He shot off the couch and to the window. He flung back the drapes, only to see what had been changed—the window of Mouse's room had been changed to a brick wall. He was trapped.

"Uh-oh."  
He paused, and turned around. The door to the room was already opened, and agents had already come in. Mouse took out the two machine guns he had brought along with him, in case something bad happened. He began firing hundreds of rounds off at the agents. With super-human speed, the agents dodged every single one of the bullets until Mouse was empty.

That was when the agents took out _their _guns. They fired ten, short shots straight at his chest.

Meanwhile, back on the Nebucadnezzar, Tank watched as the heart monitor above Mouse's body began to slow down. He saw that Mouse's real-world body was thrashing violently, as if being shot repeatedly. And, the second The Matrix told Mouse that he was dead, Tank saw as Mouse's heart monitor stopped entirely. The Flatline alarm sounded. Mouse was dead.

"Well, I didn't see that coming," said Tank.

Back in The Matrix, Morpheus could see that the agents had called in the police, and there were dozens of squad cars closing in on them.

"Oh, shit," said Morpheus.

"They've called in the fuzz!" cried Trinity. "Cheese it!"

"Trinity, give me your phone!"  
"But, they'll be able to track it!"  
"Doesn't matter!"  
"But, I got this phone half price at a Radio Shack sale!"

"Yeah, but it's an AT and T phone, so it's worthless. Give me it."  
"Fine."  
Trinity handed Morpheus her cell phone. Morpheus quickly dialed a number.

"Operator," said Tank's voice.

"Tank, answering the phone 'Operator' isn't funny anymore."  
"Sorry."

"I need a map of this building, fast."  
Tank began typing rapidly on his keyboard.

"Got it."

"I need the main wet-wall."

"The 8th floor."

"The 8th floor," Morpheus told the others.

They followed Tank through the 8th floor, until they found a weak pressure point wall.

Of course, the line _was _tapped, and Agent Smith could hear everything that was being said through his ear microphone.

"The 8th floor," he told the police. Him and the police ran up the stairs to the 8th floor and looked around. They did not see Morpheus, Trinity, Switch, Apoc or Neo anywhere. Fortunately, they didnot see the large hole punched through in the wall in the bathroom.

At that moment, the three of them were climbing down the small space between the walls, using the pipes as footholds.

Eventually, one of the policemen heard the small sound of whispering.

"THEY'RE IN THE WALLS!" he yelled automatically. The agents and the other policemen did not need to pause. They all opened fire at the walls, hoping that one of their shots would hit one of them.

None of the shots had hit any of them yet, but they were coming damn close. The bullets began blasting holes in the walls and the pipes.

"I'll hold them off!" Morpheus yelled to Trinity. "Get Neo out! It's the only thing that matters! Well, that, and who wins the Superbowl. But mainly Neo!"

Neo thought about how The Oracle had said that he wasn't The One. He also knew that Morpheus believed that he was The One. Morpheus was going to have himself killed so that Neo could survive. Between the life of the leader of the humans, and Neo's life, Neo knew that he should be the one to die.

"No!" screamed Neo. "Don't go!"

"Get out of here, Neo!" yelled Morpheus. "You're more important than me!"  
"But—"

"Go!"

Neo groaned, and began to lower himself down the walls.

"This is going to be one of those 'I told you so' things, isn't it?" he grunted.

They climbed to the basement and smashed through the walls. There were more police there. After a couple of gun shots and a lot of kung fu, they were all dead. They four of them found a catch basin, and climbed in.

Back on the 8th floor, Agent Smith was examining Morpheus. 

"The great Morpheus. We meet at last."  
"Yo."

"'Sup?"

"No'in' much."

"Me too."

"Sweet."

"I'm down."  
"Who are you?"  
"Agent Smith."  
"All of you agents look the same."  
"Speaking of which, did you know that Conan O'Brian is actually an—"

"Aren't you supposed to be fighting me?"  
"Oh, right. Okay, let's get this over with so I can kidnap you.

There was a huge kung fu sequence, lots of bullet-time shots, and a lot of stunt wire. After a minute, Morpheus was easily lying on the ground, too tired to keep moving.

"That was easy," commented Agent Smith. "Take 'im."  
Dozens of police officers rushed into the room; too many for Morpheus to fight. He had been captured.

Cypher, meanwhile, had been caught by the police and brought to the agents. He had been set free, of course, and then he had devised a plan to find out where the rest of them would go, to help the agents. He called Tank.

"Operator."  
"I need an exit."  
"Cypher?"

"Yeah. There's been a car accident. My squad car crashed. I'm out now."  
"Oh. Well, there's a phone at Franklin and Erie, at an appliance store."

"Thanks, man! You're my saviour! My own personal Jesus Christ!"

"Hmm...isn't it a coincidence that you look just like the guy who said that line?"

"I guess."  
Cypher hung up.

"Franklin and Erie," he said to the agents.

"Operator."

"It's Trinity. I need an exit."  
"Franklin and Erie."

"Okay, thanks."  
"You're not far from Cypher."

"Cypher? I thought the police got him."  
"Not anymore."

"Okay, bye."

Cypher got to the appliance shop first. He heard the phone ringing. He picked it up.

Back on the Nebucadnezzar, Cypher's real body jerked back into reality. He got out of the chair and past Tank, who was examining the proximity of the others to the appliance shop. Cypher went to the back of the room, and picked up something that was only to be used in emergencies—a high-powered atomic laser radiated rifle.

Back in The Matrix, Neo, Trinity, Switch and Apoc had reached the shop. They heard the phone ringing. 

"I love the sound of a phone ringing in The Matrix," said Switch.

"I love the smell of napalm in the morning," said Apoc.

"Déjà vu!" said Neo.

"Okay, kill Apoc," said Trinity.

Meanwhile, back on the Nebucadnezzar, just as the others were about to get into the shop, Cypher called to Tank, "Hey, Tank!"

Tank turned around. "Yeah?"  
"Look at this awesome new toy I got!"

Cypher held up the laser rifle.

"What is that? Is it like, a laser?"  
"Yeah, it's a laser pointer."  
"Cool."  
"My new laser pointer."  
"Cool."  
"Want to see it work?"  
"Yeah, totally!"

BLAM! 

"Tank!" cried Dozer, from across the room. He ran up to Tank's body.

"You killed him!" yelled Tank. He got up, and ran towards Cypher, his arms outstretched.

BLAM! 

Both Tank and Dozer were now dead.

Cypher noticed something on the screen. Trinity had picked up the phone. Cypher walked over to the microphone and said into it, "Operator."

"Cypher?" asked Trinity.

"Wassup?"

"Wassup!"

"Wasssah!"

"Wasssssah!"

"Aaahhhhhh!"

"Aaahhhhhhh!

"Aaaaahhhhhh!"

"Okay, we should stop now."  
"Yeah."

"So, where's Tank?"  
"Dead."  
"Dead?"  
"I shot him."  
"You little—!"

"You know, for a long time, I was in love with you, Trinity. I had dreams about you."  
"You killed Tank, didn't you?"

"No!" yelled Apoc.

"Oh, god!" yelled Switch.

"I'm tired, Trinity," Cypher replied. "I'm tired of this war, I'm tired of fighting. I'm tired of this ship, of being cold, of eating the same fucking goop every day. But most of all, I'm tired of this jagoff and all of his bullshit."

Cypher's eyes wandered over to Morpheus' body, unconscious. His mind was in The Matrix, perfectly vulnerable to outside harm.  
Trinity now realized how Morpheus had been captured so easily.

"You gave Morpheus to the police, didn't you?"

"Yeah, so what if I did?"  
"You son of a—how could you do that?"  
"Easy! It was actually pretty fun, really!" responded Cypher. "I believe that humans have a place in the world, and the real world is not it."  
"But The Matrix isn't real."  
"I disagree. I think The Matrix is more real than the real world. For instance, all I see is me pulling the switch. You have to see Apoc dying."  
"Those aren't the right lines."

"Who cares? DEAD!"  
Trinity watched as Apoc's eyes rolled back into his head, and his body slumped to the ground, completely lifeless.

"Well, you don't see that every day," commented Trinity.

"And, if you have anything you've always wanted to say to Switch, I suggest you do it now."  
"Okay," said Neo, hearing Cypher's voice from the cell phone. "Switch, I love y—"

Switch collapsed to the ground.

"Too late," said Cypher.

"Damn!" said Neo.

"But, you've been unplugged," said Trinity. "You can't go back."

Cypher made a buzzing noise.

"That's what Morpheus the cock sucker wants you to think. But the agents will put me back to sleep, and when I wake up, I'll be rich, fat, and I won't remember a goddamn thing. God bless America!"

"God damn you, Cypher!" yelled Trinity.

"Hmm...I wonder what the human's rebellion would be with the absence of Neo."

"Cypher, you wouldn't..."

"If he's really The One, then I shouldn't be able to pull the plug, should I? Need to a god damn miracle to stop me!"

Trinity looked at Neo nervously.

"What?" he said. "What are you staring at me for? Do I have something in my teeth?"

Cypher smiled.

"You never did answer me, Trinity," he said. "Do you believe Morpheus' bullshit? Do you believe that this fucking moron in The One?"

There was a long pause. And then, Trinity muttered her answer so quiet, that Neo could not hear.

"Yes."  
"WHAT?" yelled Cypher. "YOU BELIEVE THAT ASSHOLE IS THE ONE? I DON'T BELIEVE IT!"

Cypher did not notice a charred yet still alive Tank aim the laser rifle at him.  
"Believe it or not, you'll burn in Hell, you piece of shit!"  
_BLAM!_

Cypher was dead. For good.

By now, Trinity had hung up the phone. For the past few seconds, she had been expecting Neo to fall to the ground, dead. But he did not. After a few seconds, the phone rang again. They knew that it must've been someone other than Cypher.

"You first," said Neo.

Trinity picked up the phone. She then felt herself lying down in the seat on the Nebucadnezzar. She opened her eyes. Tank was there.  
"Tank, you're hurt."  
"I'll be okay."  
"Dozer?"  
Tank looked down.

"Gone."  
"I'm so sorry..."  
"It's okay."  
"What about the mindless swearing?"  
Tank looked down.

"Gone."  
"I'm so sorry..."  
"It's okay."

Neo opened his eyes a few seconds later.

The Matrix. Government office building. Agent Smith was interrogating Morpheus. Agent Jones was attaching electrodes to his brain, to see what he was thinking at any given time. He was on a chair in the middle of the room on the top floor, a pair of handcuffs on his wrists. Agent Smith was staring out the window at the huge city that lay before them.

"It's beautiful, isn't it, Morpheus?" asked Smith. "Six billion on this planet, people, all so...oblivious."

He walked over to Morpheus.

"When The Matrix was created, we let the humans know it was all virtual reality. No, it wasn't real, but everyone would always be happy. The world was perfect. But still, no one accepted the program, and entire crops were lost. Agent Thompson accidentally set them on fire. But if anyone asks, it was the human's fault.

"That is when we saw that human beings define reality through pain and suffering, so we made the world normal, with crime, death, pain, suffering...and the humans accepted it. Well, they didn't _accept _it; it was more of a _they-didn't-know-it-was-virtual-since-we didn't-tell-them-this-time _sort of thing.

"The perfect world was a world that humans always wanted to get out of. So The Matrix was re-designed, to the turn of the century. The peak of your civilization. Or should I say, since this was the dawning of artificial intelligence, the peak of _our _civilization?"

Agent Smith turned to Agent Jones.

"Double the dosage," he said.

Agent Brown came in.

"We've got trouble," he said.

Back on the Nebucadnezzar, Tank was watching Morpheus' life support monitor carefully. He seemed to be concerned.

"What is it?" asked Neo.

"They're hacking into his brain."  
"How?"

"The inject a serum into his brain to disable his alpha waves. It's like hacking a computer. All it takes is time."  
"How much time?"  
"Depends on the mind. But eventually, all minds crack, and then his brain will look like this."  
Tank turned to the screen. There was a brain wave monitor on the screen. It looked like a heart monitor for your brain. Tank typed a few buttons, and soon, the brain wave bar stopped moving. It was perfectly still.

"If this happens," said Tank, "Then he would tell Smith anything he wants him to. He would give out the access codes to Zion's mainframe. If the agents had that code, they could hack into the defense system and render Zion completely powerless to prevent invasion."  
"And...that's bad?"

There was a pause.

"Just how stupid are you?"

"Very!"

"Okay, shut up, then."  
"Will do!"

Meanwhile, in the government building...

"Never send a human to do a machine's job," said Agent Smith.

"If, indeed, Reagan had failed," said Agent Brown, "They will sever the connection as soon as possible, unless—"

"They are dead," said Agent Jones. "In either case—"

"We have no choice but to continue as planned," said Agent Smith. "Deploy the sentinels. Immediately."

"Sentence fragment!" yelled Agent Brown.

"'Sentence fragment' _is _a sentence fragment," said Agent Smith.

"Umm...I knew that."

Back on the Nebucadnezzar...

The three survivors, Neo, Tank, and Trinity, were trying to figure out what to do in a situation like this.

"There has to be something we can do," said Trinity.

"There is," said Tank. "We have to kill Morpheus."

"What?" 

"Dude, I'm not killing Morpheus!"

"Why not?" 

"Déjà vu!" said Neo.

"What?" groaned Trinity.

"Well, there's this show that I used to watch in The Matrix called South Park, and—"

"Neo, honestly, if you keep having déjà vu, we're gonna have to kill you, too."

"Sorry."

Tank looked up.

"You know we can't let the agents know the codes," he said.

"I know, but still..."  
"It's our only choice."

"I know...alright. We'll pull the plug."

Neo looked up and paused.

If it was him or Morpheus who was going going to die, it would not be Morpheus. He needed some way to stop Tank from killing Morpheus. But what could he do?

Tank stood next to Morpheus' lifeless body.

"Morpheus, you were more than our leader," he said in a sad tone. "You were... our father. We will miss you, always."

Tank's hand closed around the plug, and just as he was about to pull the life support off of Morpheus—  
"STOP!" yelled Neo.

"What?" groaned Trinity in an annoyed tone. "Did you have déjà vu again?"  
"No, not that," said Neo. "Well, yeah, I did, but that doesn't matter! It's The Oracle. She told me that I wasn't The One. And I know realize that Morpheus would be willing to sacrafice his life, the one life that could lead the humans to beat The Matrix, to save my useless life, who he believes is the life of The One. I can't let him die to save me."  
Tank and Trinity stared at him.

"What can you do?" she asked.

Neo paused and walked over to the chair.

"I'm going in after him."

There was a long pause.

"Fine," muttered Tank. "Kill yourself. See if I care."

"Hey!"

Author's Notes: Tomorrow, Neo's true fate, and that awesome government lobby scene! Stay tuned!


	8. Suicide Mission

**Chapter 8: Suicide Mission**

"So, you're really going to try to rescue Morpheus?"

"Yes."  
"Excuse me while I roll on the floor with laughter."

"Shut up."  
"Honestly, Neo, this is loco. They've got Morpheus in a military-controlled building. Even if you somehow got inside, those are agents holding him. Three of them! I want Morpheus back, too, but what you are talking about is suicide."

"Suicide, or genius?" he asked slyly.

"Suicide," repeated Tank.

"I know that's what it looks like, but it's not. I can't logically explain to you why it's not. Morpheus believed something and he was ready to give his life for what he believed. I understand that now. That's why I have to go."

"Umm...that's a _really _stupid idea."  
"That's what _you _think."

"No, that's what it _is. _This really is a stupid idea."

"I don't think so."  
"Why not?"  
"Because I believe in something."  
"What's that?"  
"I believe that I can bring him back."  
Tank stared at Neo.

"Well, of course you believe you can bring him back, stupid! That's why you're going!"

"Oh, yeah. I forgot about that."

Trinity paused, and then walked over to Neo at got into the chair beside him.

"I'm coming with you," she told him.

"No, you're not."  
Trinity glared at him.

"I'm not, am I?" she said in an angry tone. "Let me tell you what I believe. I believe Morpheus means more to me than he does to you. I believe that if you are serious about saving him then you are going to need my help. And, since I am the ranking officer on this ship, if you don't like it then I believe that you can go to hell, because you aren't going anywhere else. Load us up, Tank."

"Bitch..." muttered Neo under his breath.

Meanwhile, in the government building, where Morpheus was being interrogated by Agent Smith...

"You know, Morpheus," said Smith, "After my years in The Matrix with humans, I've discovered one thing—that human beings are not mammals. Because mammals find one specific habitat, and adjust to it until they can stay there the rest of their lives. But humans, on the other hand, do not live in one specific habitat. They find somewhere in their area, and multiply. And they multiply until every single natural resource in the area is consumed. The only other organism that follows this same pattern in the virus. Human beings are a virus, and the agents are the cure."

"You mean, we're the band, The Cure?" asked Agent Jones.

"No, moron, I mean the antidote, moron."  
"Oh, right. Of course."  
"Now, as I was saying—"

"But, aren't antidotes good?"  
"What?"  
"Aren't antidotes, like, good things, and, aren't agents, like, bad things?"  
"Um...Jones, you're fired."  
"Aww..."

Smith turned back to Morpheus.

"Anyway, as I was saying. My childhood was very sad. A boy named Tim used to steal my lunch money. Then, I took my gun and blew his brains off."

Back on the Nebucadnezzar...

Trinity and Neo needed supplies, so Tank had sent them to The Construct.

"Okay," said Tank's disembodied voice to Neo and Trinity, "You're in. What do you want me to get?"  
"We're gonna need guns," said Neo. "Lots of guns."

Just then, huge racks of guns came shooting towards the two of them, and stopped with them right between two aisles.

"Ow!" cried Neo. "That thing hit my foot when it came by! Ooh!"

"You know, no one's ever done anything like this before."  
"That's how I know it's gonna work."

"That's terrible logic."  
"Yeah, well...so's your face!"

The Matrix. The government building. Interrogation room.

"Why isn't the serum working?" asked Agent Brown.

"Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions," said Agent Smith.

Agent Smith paused.

"Leave me with him."

Agent Brown stared at Smith.

"NOW!"  
"Okay, geese, you don't have to spaz out on me!"

Brown left the room. Smith pulled up a chair and sat next to Morpheus. He pulled his ear microphone to his ear, as to not be interrupted.

"Can you hear me, Morpheus?" he asked. "I'm going to be honest with you. I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can't stand it any longer. It's the smell, if there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I've somehow been infected by it."

Agent Smith grabbed Morpheus' head.

"I _need _those codes. Once Zion is destroyed, I don't have to be in The Matrix any more. I'll be free. Free as the crow flies. Hey, that would make a great name for a poem! Agent Jones, write this down! Oh, right, I fired him. Anyway, tell me the codes, or you will die."

His grip on Morpheus' head grew tighter.

Tank looked across the control room to Morpheus' body.

"Don't worry, Morpheus. They're coming."

The Matrix. Government Building. Main lobby.

Trinity and Neo had to get into the building, of course, but they knew that it would be hard to get past security with all the guns they had. So, they had brought even more guns.

Neo wore dark sunglasses and a black trench coat. He needed a trench coat to hide all of the guns he had. Trinity was behind him, carrying a dark suitcase.

Neo put his gun-filled duffel bag on the conveyor belt and walked through the metal detector. It went off, of course.

"Would you please remove any metallic items you are carrying," said the guard in a drawl that showed that he had said this speech dozens of times before. "Keys, loose change—"

Neo opened his trench coat, revealing that he was armed with dozens of knives, grenades, machine guns, handguns, and several other weapons.

"Sorry, buddy," said the security guard, "I'm not interested in buying any black market weapons."

"What? You thought I was trying to sell these weapons to you?"  
"Well, yeah, with the trench coat and all..."  
"No, I'm gonna kill you!"  
"Oh, right."

"Right."  
Neo and Trinity ran forward, taking out two handguns per hand, and began firing dozens of rounds at the guards.

_BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!_

A second wave of guards rushed in, trying to draw their guns fast enough.

_BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!_

A horde of special ops guards came rushing in with assault rifles. Neo knew that he would need more than handguns. He took out two Uzi's and, as he ran backwards to get a better view of where the guards were, opened fire on anyone he saw. He took out about 2/5 of them with the Uzi's, and Trinity finished off about another 1/5. Neo needed to take it up a notch. He threw his Uzi's to the ground and took out two M16s. He jumped to his side, and began spinning through the air to try to dodge the bullets, and he opened fire on the guards with his machine guns. About half of the remaining guards were left. He ran towards the wall, and began to run up across the wall, as if gravity was pulling the wrong way for him. He held his arms horizontally and began blasting off. He pushed off from the wall and shot down the remaining guards in mid-air.

When he landed on the ground, he and Trinity exchanged glances.

"Whoa," said Neo. "That ruled...I wonder how much money that scene costed."

"Well, it sure costed a lot of money in wasted scenery. Look at this whole set! Ruined!"  
"Those stupid Wachowski brothers. I bet those set designers will quit for having so much of their time wasted."

"Dude, this movie was made five years ago, and no one quit."  
"They didn't? Morons."

The two of them then headed for the elevator.

In the middle of Smith's interrogation, Agent Brown burst into the room.  
"Smith, did you hear the news?"  
"About Greg and Michelle hooking up?"  
"Yeah, I know!"

"It's, like, totally—wow!"

"Like, I know!"  
"Totally!"  
"Okay, but that's not the real news."  
"It isn't? Bummer!"

"The real news is—well, put on your microphone."  
Smith put the microphone back in his ear, and what he heard did not please him at all.

Well, maybe a _little_, but that was because he was thinking of a joke he had heard earlier.

Meanwhile, back in the lobby, Neo and Trinity were in the elevator. Trinity had opened her suitcase, and it was now evident what was in the suitcase—a napalm bomb. She was hurriedly wiring it.

"I think they're trying to save Morpheus," said Agent Brown.

Back in the elevator shaft, Neo and Trinity had cut open the top of the elevator roof and had climbed into the shaft. Neo ratcheted down a clamp onto the elevator cable. Both of them locked on. He looked up the long, dark throat of the building and took a deep breath.

"There is no spoon," he murmured.

Neo whipped out his gun and pressed it to the cable, lower than they attached themselves. _BLAM!_

The cable snapped. The counter-weights plummeted, yanking Trinity and Neo up through the shaft as the elevator fell away beneath them, distending space, filling it with the sound of whistling metal as they sear to the top.

The elevator hit the bottom of the shaft just as the bomb exploded.

"Hey! Hey, over hear! Me, the security guard! You didn't quite kill me; you just shot my leg! If you could come and help me, I think I'll be okay! Hey! Anyone? Trench coat man? Jump-suit lady? Anyone? Aww, fine! I'll be okay by myself, as long as I can just get to the hospital across the street—aah! An exploding elevator! I am dying in a flaming doom! Aaaah!"

The sound of fire alarms rang through the building.

"It's coming from the lower level," said Agent Brown.

"They are actually attacking," said Agent Smith.

"Well, I know that! I'm not a retard!"

"I know, I was just saying—"

"...like you..."

"Hey! Did you just call me a retard?"  
"No."  
"Good. Now, find them and destroy them."

Neo and Trinity had got to the roof. Guards had swarmed in, but the two of them had taken care of all of them. One of the guards was hovering near the roof in a helicopter.

"I repeat, we are under attack! I need backup!" he said into the radio. Then, suddenly, Neo and Trinity watched as the pilot's body dissolved, and Agent Brown emerged.

Brown jumped out of the helicopter and began walking across the roof behind Neo.

Neo saw the expression of horror on Trinity's face. He whipped around, just in time to see Jones hold up his gun. Suddenly, everything seemed to be in slow motion. Neo paused for a second, and saw that bullets coming out of Brown's gun, coming at him at what couldn't have been more than 3 miles an hour. Neo leaned back as far as he could, further than he should have been able to, but he did not fall. He stayed horizontal, watching as the bullets slowly passed over his face. But he was too distracted to notice one of the bullets. It hit his shoulder, creating a deep gouge.

"Owie! It hurts!"  
Neo began to cry.

Another bullet whizzed through the air and slashed into his thigh. Suddenly, the world went back into real time. He felt himself fall to the ground. Brown walked up in front of Neo and held up his gun to Neo.

"Only human," he said with a smile.

He did not see Trinity come up behind him and hold her .45 to his head.

"Dodge this," she muttered.

_BLAM!_

Agent Brown's lifeless body fell to the ground next to Neo.

Trinity leaned forward and pulled Neo up.

"How did you do that?"  
"Do what?"  
"The way you dodged those bullets. You moved like they did. I've never seen a human move that fast."  
"Not fast enough," said Neo, as he examined his shoulder and his leg.

"Are you okay?"  
"I'll be fine."

Neo looked over at the helicopter.

"Can you fly that thing?"  
"Not yet."

She took out her phone.

"Operator."  
"Tank, what did we tell you about answering the phone?"  
Tank groaned.

"_Fine. _Hello?"  
"Tank?"  
"Um...yes?"  
"I need a flight program on a B-F120."

"Comin' right up."

Tank looked through his drawers, found a small disk, and slid it into the drive.

Suddenly, just as Neo had learned kung fu in two seconds, Trinity suddenly knew how to fly a B-F120.  
She opened her eyes and looked up.  
"I know kung fu."  
"No, you don't, you know how to fly a B-F120!"  
"Oh, yeah."  
"Do you know how to fly it yet?" asked Neo.

"Yes, moron! Weren't you listening?"  
"Umm...no. You're on a phone. I can't hear what Tank is saying."  
"Oh, right."  
"YES! Now, after weeks of you doing it to me, I can finally be the one to call _you _a moron! Mo—!"

"Shut up!"

"Aww..."

"Let's go."  
Trinity and Neo ran into the helicopter, and Trinity took off.

Back in the building, a marine sergeant ran up to Agent Smith.

"Sir! There was gunfire—we've lost communication with the roof!"

"Remain at your posts."  
"But, sir, I suggest we evacuate!"  
"You suggested we all eat the lightbulbs for lunch two hours ago!"  
"Hey! I did not say that! Oh, wait...never mind..."

The sergeant retreated in embarrassment.

Just then, Smith heard a loud noise. He turned to his side. Right outside the window was the helicopter, the side door open, and a .50 machine gun positioned at the interrogation room.

"Oh, shit."

"See? I told you interrogation rooms shouldn't have huge windows! But did you listen? Nooooo!"

"Shut up."

Then, Neo pulled back the trigger of the gigantic gun, and hundreds or rounds blasted into the room.

BLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAMBLAM! 

Smith was the first one to fall back, and then Jones fell, his handgun still firing uselessly.

Neo looked over at Morpheus, still in the chair.

"Morpheus, get up!" yelled Neo. "Come on, stop being lazy and get up!"

Neo began to attach a rope inside the helicopter around a harness on his chest.

No one saw three marines out in the hallway dissolve into three agents.

Morpheus stared up, his eyes blazing with their normal ferocity. He stood up and snapped the handcuffs apart. He took off running towards the smashed window on the other end of the room. The three agents on the other side of the wall in the hallway opened fire. The bullets shattered through the drywall and Morpheus ran through the rain of the fire alarms. One of the bullets got lodged into Morpheus' leg, tainting the puddles of water around his with blood.

Neo's eyes narrowed as Morpheus ran towards the window.

"He's not going to make it."  
Morpheus lunged through the window into the air towards the elevator. Neo saw that Morpheus was going to fall short. He lunged forward and grabbed onto Morpheus just as he was about to fall to the ground. Neo was now left hanging by the rope attached to the harness, trying to keep up Morpheus.

"Gotcha!" he yelled.

Back on the Nebucadnezzar, Tank stared at the screen. 

"Amazing..." he said. "A pop-up blocker for $2! Wow! Okay, back to the Matrix screen. Wow! Neo's gotta be the one! But, how?"

Back in The Matrix, Trinity was already flying the helicopter away from the government building.

Smith got up, took out his handgun, and began firing. He only managed to hit the helicopter's window. And a window across the street.

"AAAH! I'VE BEEN SHOT BY A BULLET FROM ACROSS THE STREET AND NOW I'M FALLING OUT OF MY WINDOW AND PLUMMETING TOWARDS THE STREET!"

WHUMP! 

"Find them and take them out!" commanded Smith.

Trinity landed the helicopter a few blocks away. Neo, Trinity and Morpheus got onto the roof.

"Morpheus!" cried Trinity as she saw him again.

"Yo!"  
"Sup, G-Homey?"

"So, you believe that Neo's The One, now, Trinity?"

"But, Morpheus, The Oracle said that I wasn't The One!"  
"She only said what you needed to hear. She said that you weren't The One, so that you would come to try to save me, where you would discover that you were The One."  
"Oh! Reverse psychology, eh?"

"Yeah."  
"Sweet!"

Tank heard the phone ring.

"Op—I mean, _hello."_

"Tank."  
"Hey, Morpheus! Welcome back!"  
"Thanks."  
"You're welcome."  
"Thanks for saying you're welcome!"  
"You're welcome for saying your welcome for saying thank you!"

"Thank you for—okay, this is getting annoying. I need an exit."  
"Already got one. The subway station at State and Balbo."  
"Gotcha."

"So, um...bye."  
"Bye." 

There was a long pause.

"Hang up."

"No, _you _hang up!"

"No, _you!"_

"No, _you!"_

"No, _you!"_

"No, _y_—hey, he hung up on me!"  
  
Author's Notes: Tomorrow, read Chapter 9. Today, review Chapter 8.


	9. The One

Author's Notes: This is it. This is the chapter that will test the wills of all the characters. Stay tuned.

**Chapter 9: The One**

The access door to the roof opened, and the three agents rushed through. But Neo, Morpheus and Trinity were already gone.

"Damn!" yelled Smith.

"The trace was completed," said Agent Brown.

"We have their position," said Agent Jones.

"The extermination unit is in place," said Agent Brown.

"Order the strike," said Agent Jones.

"Hey, why are you still here? Didn't Trinity kill you?"  
"Didn't Neo kill _you?"_  
"Oh, yeah. Nevermind."

Agent Smith was not listening. He was looking out on the huge city.

"They're not out yet," he said to himself.

Back in the subway station, an old homeless man sat in the corner, covered in some spare blankets. He looked over and saw three people walking up to the graffiti-stained telephone booth. One was a bald man dressed all in black, another was a thin little creepy man with a trench coat, and the third was a woman in a black jump suit. The phone in the booth began to ring.  
"Morpheus, you first," said the woman to the bald man.

"He's not Morpheus, _I _am!" said the thin man.

"Honestly, woman, you call yourself _our _crewmember."

"Oh, sorry, Neo!"

The bald man walked up to the phone.

"Only joking, I _am _Morpheus!" said the bald man, and he picked up the phone and vanished.

The old man blinked in amazement.

Trinity turned to Neo.

"Neo, there's something I need to tell you," she said. "Something I've never told anyone before."  
"It's okay, Trinity!" said Neo. "I'm perfectly fine with closet homosexuals!"  
"What? No, no, no, it's not that!"  
"Oh. Sorry."

The phone began to ring again, and a low rumble could be heard in the distance.

"It's just that...when I visited The Oracle's house, she told me that—"

Just then, Neo saw that the rumbling turned out to be a subway coming up. The sound of the train totally blocked out what Trinity was saying. After a few seconds, the train went out of view and the sound died down. Neo could now hear Trinity's voice again.

"...and that's what I wanted to tell you," she concluded.  
"Oh, I'm sorry," said Neo, "I couldn't hear you over the sound of the train. What?"  
"I said—oh, I'll tell you when we get back on the ship."  
"Aww..."  
Trinity reached for the ringing phone. She paused, and turned over to see that the old man had dissolved into Agent Smith. She stared in horror for a moment, and then picked up the phone. She disappeared just as several bullets flew from Smith's gun into the booth. She disappeared before the bullets hit her, but Smith _did _manage to shoot the receiver, leaving the phone broken beyond use. It seemed that Neo would not escape so soon after all.

"Aww, crap!" exclaimed Neo. "So close!"

Back on the Nebucadnezzar, Trinity felt her eyes open.

"Neo!" she yelled.

"What is it?" asked Tank from across the room.

"An agent! Neo! Gun! Bang! Glass! Elephant! You've gotta send me back!"  
"No can do!"  
"Why not?"  
"No reason. Just makes the movie more interesting."  
"Damn you, plot device!"

Back in the subway station, there is silence for a second. Smith and Neo stared at each other, and then suddenly, the whipped out their guns and open fire. It seemed that everything moved in slow motion for a moment, as bullets whizzed by.

Neo and Smith lunged forward into the air, bullets shooting out of their guns at each other. They collided onto each other, and landed painfully on the ground, but they landed with their guns at each other's head.  
"You're empty."  
"Am not!"

"Yeah! You know it!"

"Nu-uh!"  
"Yeah!"  
"No!"  
"You know it!"  
"Nu-uh!"  
"You know it!"

_BLAM!_

There was a pause.

"Okay, you _weren't _empty, but you still missed that last shot."

"Damn."

"Haha!"  
"Well, you're empty, too."  
"I am?"  
_Click!  
_"Damn."

They stared at each other. It looked like this was going to be hand-to-hand combat.

"CHY-AAAAHH!" yelled Neo.

"HYA-CHAAAAHH!" yelled Smith.

They ran at each other.

A knife-hand opened his forearm, and a kick sent him slamming back against a steel column. Stunned, he ducked just under a punch that crunched into the beam, steel chunks exploding like shrapnel. Behind him, Neo leapt into the air, delivering a neck- snapping reverse roundhouse. Agent Smith's glasses flew off and he glared at Neo, his eyes ice blue.

"I'm going to enjoy watching you die, Mr. Anderson," he said angrily.

"What, are you some kind of sadistic asshole?"  
"Well—um...yo mama's so fat, that if she...um...did...the thing..."

"You suck at telling jokes."  
"Oh, _I _suck?"  
"That's what I just said."  
"I'd like to see _you _tell a joke."  
"Okay, here goes..."

"Gotcha!"

Agent Smith, using Neo's distraction, attacked with unrelenting fury, fists pounding Neo like jackhammers.

Inside the Nebucadnezzar, Trinity watched Neo as his body jerks, his mouth coughing blood, his life signs going wild.

"Jesus, he's killing him!" yelled Trinity.

"He'll be fine," laughed Tank.

He looked at the screen and saw Neo's life monitors.

"Jesus, he's killing him!" he yelled.

Trinity groaned.

Agent Smith grabbed hold of him, lifted him into the air, and hurled him against the curved wall of the train tunnel, where he fell inches from the electrified third-rail. The Agent was about to jump down and press his attack when he hears something. From deep in the tunnel, like an animal cry; a burst of high-speed metal grinding against metal.

"Do you hear that, Mr. Anderson?" asked Smith. "It is the sound of your death."

"Yes, of course I hear it. What, you think I'm some kinda deaf-guy?"

"Well, no, I was just—"

"That's it! This relationship is _so _over!"  
"But, I can change!"

"That's what they all say..."  
"Yeah, but—wait a second, what the hell are we talking about? I should be telling you about how you're going to die."  
"Oh, right."  
"Well, you are."  
"Shit."

"Goodbye, Mr. Anderson."  
Neo paused. He stared down the tunnel, at the train speeding towards him. He knew that this was not his time to die.

"My name is Neo."

He lunged up through the air, higher than humanly possible. He flew up, did a double mid-air front flip and landed on the floor beside the tunnel. He watched as Agent Smith, still in the tunnel, disappeared from view as the train shot into the station, smashing into Smith with full force.

Neo turned to leave, when suddenly, just as the subway grinded to a halt, the doors of the last car were flung open, and Agent Smith stormed out, mad as hell.

"What the...? Now, how the hell did that happen? Jesus!"

Back on the Nebu—oh, screw it.

"What happened?" cried Trinity.

"I dunno. I just lost him," replied Tank.

"He's on the run," said Morpheus.

"Oh, shit," said Tank.

A siren began blaring.

_BLAAAAAH! BLAAAAH! BLAAAAH!_

"What's that?" cried Trinity.

"That's just the microwave," said Morpheus. "My hot pockets are done!"

A different alarm began blaring.  
_WEEEEEeeeeeeEEEEEEoooooOOOOOoooooEEEEEEeeeeEOEOEOEOEO!  
_"Okay, now what's _this _alarm for?"  
"Squids," answered Tank.

"Hphw fphpr awphpy?"

"Morpheus, don't talk with your mouth full. And about five minutes."  
"APHM THMPH EMP!"

"Cut it out, Morpheus!"

"EMP ready!"

"FIRE THE LASERS!"  
"You mean EMP?"  
"Um...yeah, sure..."

"But, we can't fire the EMP without Neo on board!"

"I know, I'm not stupid! But don't worry, he'll make it."

Back in The Matrix...

Keywords "..."!

Oooo! Dot dot dot! Scary!

Anyway, back in The Matrix, Neo ran down the street. He looked up and saw a guy talking on a cell phone. He could hear what the guy was saying.

"So then, I was all like, 'I totally saw Ted Danson,' and Becky was all, 'No way _that _was Ted Danson,' and then—what the hell?"

Neo had snatched the guy's phone and began running into an alley.

"Hey, that guy totally stole my phone! Like, _what-EVER!"_

Neo quickly hung up and dialled Tank's number.

"Operhello," said Tank.

"Mr. Wizard, get me the hell outta here"  
"Sure thing, but why are you saying it like a question?"  
"The author accidentally pressed the 2 key instead of the 1 key."  
"Then why doesn't he just, you know, scroll up and re-type it?"  
"Too lazy."  
"Ah."

"Anyway, Smith's comin' down on me with a truck! Get me outta here!"

"I got a patch on an old exit. Wabash and Lake. A hotel. Room 303."  
"Now, why does that sound familiar?" asked Neo rhetorically.

"DUCK!"

Neo ducked down just as bullets chewed into the wall in front of him, fresh from Agent Smith's gun.

"GAAH! THAT ALMOST HIT ME!"

"That door!"  
"What door?"  
"The door to your left!"

"Which left? This left?"  
"No, the other left!"

"Oh. Hey, a door!"

"Go through it."  
"It's locked."

"Kick it in!"

"But that would be vandalising!"  
"So?"  
"Isn't vandalisation a crime?"  
"Dude, you killed about 30 security guards 20 minutes ago. I think your criminal record is as low as it can go."  
"Oh, right. I forgot about that."

"Okay, now go through the door on your left."  
"Why haven't the Agents fired at me yet?"  
"I dunno, just go!"

Neo kicked down the door and ran in.

"Now down that hall."

Neo ran down that hall. The door at the end of that hall crashed down and an agent ran in.

"Shit! To your left!"

Neo ran to your left.

"No! Your other left!"

Neo ran to your other left. He kicked down the door in his way and ran through. The door was destroyed with bullets seconds later.

"Now straight! Now left! Now down! Now up! No sideways! No up side down! Now back side up! Now front side ollie! Now right!"  
Neo was now in an apartment. He ran past an old lady watching Blues Clues on television and into the kitchen, where another old lady was chopping brains.

"Now, that window!"

Neo jumped through the window just as a knife was launched at his head by the dissolved old lady/agent. Neo landed on the fire escape. Neo shot down.  
"You're almost there! Jou can do eet, Neeky! The fire escape on the end of the alley!"  
Neo landed on the ground with a thud and ran off towards the other side of the alley. The hotel looked strangely familiar. He did not realise that was Trinity's hotel.

"I'm gonna make the call," said Tank.

"And you're telling me this...why?"

A red light flashed.

"No," muttered Trinity.

"Here they come," said Morpheus.

The sentinels crashed down on top of the Nebuwhatever and jammed their spikes into it. 

"Hurry, Neo!" urged Trinity.

Neo bolted down the hallway, bullets blasting left and right, just missing him each time. Neo checked the door numbers. 310, 309, 308, 307, 306, 305, 304—

Neo lunged at the door of room 303, and just as he opened the door, he saw Agent Smith standing there, with his .45, armed and ready.

Agent Smith made the sound from PacMan when you died.

"Eee-ooo-ree-ooo-reee-ooo...blip blip!"

"You have an awful singing voice."  
"Oh, yeah? Well...you're dead!"

_BLAM!_

The crew of the Nebublahblahblah stared in horror as Neo's body jerked violently, and his heart monitor went Flatline. 

"No! It cannot be!" yelled Morpheus. "This is just—ahh!"

Morpheus fell over.

"What happened?" asked Tank.

"I tripped over Cypher's dead body. Didn't anyone move it out of the way or anything?"

"Um...no, but back on topic. Neo's dead!"

"Check him," said Agent Smith.

Agent Jones felt Neo's wrist.

Trinity ran up to Neo's body.

"Neo, no!" she yelled.

"He's dead," said Jones.

Smith smiled.

"Goodbye, Mr. Anderson."

"Neo," yelled Trinity, "Please hear this. I know that you're not dead, I know you're The One! Because when I visited The Oracle, she said that when I met The One, I would fall in love with him, so I know you must be The One, because I love you! You hear that? I love you! So, if you can hear this, please know that you aren't really dead."

Trinity leaned forward, and kissed Neo.

Back in The Matrix, for a moment, Neo's body lay still, and then, suddenly, his eyes jolted open.

"Now, get up!" snapped Trinity.

"Haha! Motivation!" 

Neo jumped up and turned to the agents at the end of the hall.

"Hey, agents! Missed me!"

The agents bolted around. They stared in horror for a moment, and then whipped out their guns.

"Oh, crap."

_BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM! BLAM!_

Neo stared as the bullets shot through the air at him, when suddenly, everything went it slow motion again.

"Sweet!" he yelled. "Thank you, cool cinematography!"

Neo looked at the bullets. He reached into the air, grabbed one of the slow-moving bullets, and dropped it to the ground. Everything snapped into real time again. He watched as the bullet he had dropped, and all the others that had been fired, tumble to the ground.

"How...?" murmured Tank, staring at the screen in disbelief.

"Sweet!" yelled Morpheus. "He _is _The One! Pay up!"

Tank sighed and handed Morpheus $50.

Just then, an explosion shook the ship.

"Oh, right, the sentinels have broken in to our ship. I forgot about that."

Neo looked forward. Neo had defied the laws of The Matrix. He watched as the hallway, the agents, and everything he could see turned into the Matrix codes. He saw that the agents, for the first time since their creation, felt fear. 

He turned straight forward. Smith glared at him, and ran up to him. He began to deliver blows more ferocious then he had ever before, but Neo deflected them all. Now that he knew he was The One, he didn't even have to try. It was as if he was so talented, his body did all the work for him. Neo was defending Smith, and he wasn't even looking! Neo was defending Smith, and he was doing a crossword puzzle! Neo was defending Smith, and he was hosting a talk show!  
"So, how did that occurrence help your career?" Neo asked Matt Damon.

"Well—" he started, but then Neo pushed him away.

"I'll get you for this, Anderson! The Bourne Supremacy will make more money than this movie ever can!"

"I'm making two more!"

"You are? Oh, crap! I'm screwed! And it's not like Ocean's Twelve is going to be the next _Titanic_."

Neo turned to Smith. He delivered one, single punch to him, and sent him flying across the room. Smith landed painfully on the other side. Neo bolted up to Smith, but he disappeared halfway through his run. After a few seconds, the agents stared at each other in confusion. Then, suddenly, Smith's body began to blow up like a balloon.

"I told you to keep off the carbs!" chimed Agent Brown.

"Oh, shut up!" yelled Smith, and then he exploded. Agent Smith was now gone, and Neo was standing there. Neo exchanged glances with the two agents, and they ran off in fear. Neo laughed.

Back on the ship, the sentinels were fully inside, destroying the entire place.

"Come on, guys!" yelled Morpheus. "Stop trashing the place! My parents'll be home in two hours!"

"Come on, Neo!" urged Tank.

Neo paused, and heard the sound of the phone ringing. He ran into room 303 and lunged at the phone.

There was a blinding flash of light as the EMP was activated. For a second, there was total silence.  
  
When the flash cleared, everyone saw that the sentinels had been deactivated, their robotic corpses lying on the ground.

Trinity looked at Neo's body.

"Neo?" she asked, hoping that he got to the phone before the EMP was activated.

There was a pause.

Then, Neo's eyes opened. He smiled at her. Trinity ran up, and they shared a long, passionate kiss.

2 months later...

The green letters began scrolling across the screen as the computer traced the call. A voice began to speak.

"I know you're out there," said Neo's voice. "I can feel you now. I know that you're afraid... you're afraid of us. You're afraid of change. I don't know the future. I didn't come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell you how it's going to begin. I'm going to hang up this phone, and then I'm going to show these people what you don't want them to see. I'm going to show them a world without you. A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there is a choice I leave to you."

And with that, he hung up the phone, and stared around the street at all the people. He paused for a moment. Then, he looked straight up into the air, and soared up, higher and higher, high above the city, in the world that knew no boundaries.

Then, he ran into the camera.  
"OW!" he yelled "Stupid script...Superman rip-off..."

Then, he flew off.

The End.

Author's Notes: Thanks for reading! Watch out for a Matrix Reloaded story, coming this summer! Or...maybe sooner. Stay tuned!


End file.
